richardmurray

Concrete Fables 12/26/2020 Concrete Fables illustrated lessons from the urban jungle by Richard Murray Book 4 - Richard Murray Short Story Collection Synopsis Illustrations of moral lessons from the Urban Jungle. A contemporary set of fables as potent as Aesop's. A fun set of fantasies to read anywhere. book page https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/concrete-fables series page https://www.kobo.com/us/en/series/richard-murray-short-story-collection

Der Tchrumpfs 08/24/2018 Der Tchrumpfs little people in orange, no humans can see by Richard Murray Book 6 - Richard Murray Short Story Collection Synopsis A massive world , four years old, in a little patch of white mushrooms, from little people in oragne. None of us know where to pinpoint or find them in humanity. Introducing, Der Tchrumpfs book page https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/der-tchrumpfs series page https://www.kobo.com/us/en/series/richard-murray-short-story-collection

Poetry or more 12/22/2017 Poetry or more Poetry of the months or seasons , 2015 to 2017 text only by Richard Murray Book 3 - Richard Murray Short Story Collection Synopsis Seasonal or astrological poetry from Richard Murray < HDDeviant on Deviantart> between 2015 and 2017, each month, main astrological events, text only. book page https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/poetry-or-more-1 series page https://www.kobo.com/us/en/series/richard-murray-short-story-collection

Looking West and West 12/21/2014 Looking West and West Fables you never heard of before, Riddles to tickle your eroticism by Richard Murray Book 2 - Richard Murray Short Story Collection Synopsis Fables inspired by Straparola, refering to the cultures of Africa, introductions to characters or worlds you never read before. book page https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/looking-west-and-west series page https://www.kobo.com/us/en/series/richard-murray-short-story-collection

Sunset Children Stories 05/13/2013 Sunset Children Stories Modern versions of Tales from Africa, Asia, Americas, Europe or ancient Humanity by Richard Murray Book 1 - Richard Murray Short Story Collection Synopsis A Collection of Modernized Fables and Tales. The Tales are based on Black tales from the Americas, Asia, Africa or Europe. The Fables are based on Aesop. No one will enjoy every fable or tale in the collection, but everyone will fall in love with one. FABLES The Squirrel and the Credit Card The Boy who say Cop The Cat and the Mice The Ceiling and other parts of the Room Two Schoolboys and the Bully The Pigeon in Borrowed Feathers The Street Cat and the Stray Kitten The Pigeon in Hawk Feathers The Roach Family and the Mouse The Pigeon, the Dog, and the Cat The Sparrow and the Water Fountain The Spider and the Roach The Street Dog, the Rat, and the Squirrel The Two Cats The Parent and the Butterfly The Boy and the Bee The Plastic Bag and the Leaf The Boy and the Slice of Pizza The Street Cat and the Crow The Mouse and the Potato Chips The Cat and the Sick Dog The Cat and the Seagull The Pigeon and the Blue Jay The Sparrows who wanted a President The Golden Grass The Honest Hustler The Dog and the Kitten The Street Cat and the Butterfly The Eagle's share The Dog, the Cat, and the Mice The Proud Bully The Squirrel and it's nuts The Old Skyscraper The City Wind and the Sun The Bus Stop Sign and the Garbage Can The Cab Driver and the Homeless man The Fly and the Earthworm The Squirrel and the Seagulls The Pigeon and the Butterfly The Park Mouse and the Apartment Mouse The Trees and the Dandelion The Two Bottles The Two Dogs The Stone Wall Is that a statue of Adam? The Spider and the Butterfly The Dog and the Sparrow The Gambler and the Arctic Tern The Mice Election The Dog and the Homeless Man The Dog in the Community Park The Girl and the drowned Cellphone The Dog and the Cat The Bamboo and the Blackberry Tree The Young Crow and the Old Sparrow From the Computer to the Cell Phone The Young Girl and her candy book The Twins and the Video Game The Street Mouse and the Apartment Mouse The Old Man and the Squirrel The Bedbug and the Pigeon The Toilet and the Sink FABLES APPENDIXES Aesop Fable List Non Aesop Fable List Moral List TALES Obata and the Great Will Babal's somewhat certain dream The three evenings with Ogu Shango the Murderer The First Star in the Sky Why Aso made her stories and how one may have got to you The Ghedi ring or Mahongo's ring Kofi and the kindnesses or Marie-Claire's voice Jean Britisse the Hustler Jonas Caballo Renren's very drunk birthday present The John Henry's The Princess of Mashariki Nyota Kidobinti or Lil Binti and the Blue Dog Manuel's application The really Really late Jake and why it matters so Little J and Big J Willy's bicycle route If you just ask The Alley Little Eight or The Lies of Little Eight or How Eight didn't get to eight Little Girl and Brother Kitty The Loving Water Ms. Nyumngu's freedom The honesty of Nyeusi Ajabu and the Majimke book page https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/sunset-children-stories series page https://www.kobo.com/us/en/series/richard-murray-short-story-collection

Calligraphy Mirror - Angelique Noire 09/08/2019 Calligraphy Mirror - Angelique Noire I placed the two images below but Here is my calligraphy https://www.deviantart.com/hddeviant/art/Calligraphy-Mirror-Angelique-Noire-812616098?ga_submit_new=10%3A1567983274 if you want your own , I do commissions https://www.deviantart.com/hddeviant/commission/Microcalligraphy-signatures-1487995 she is on instagram here https://www.instagram.com/the_angelique_noire/ her birthday is July 15th https://aalbc.com/tc/events/event/497-angelique-noire-birthday/ This is her original tumblr post https://thepinupnoire.tumblr.com/post/183195910761/lolita-part-3-littlebootysmatter-photo photograph from Alonza Photography https://thepinupnoire.tumblr.com/tagged/alonzaphotography mslala presents https://thepinupnoire.tumblr.com/tagged/misslalapresents Original Post in the creative tables https://aalbc.com/tc/blogs/entry/194-richard-murray-creative-table/page/6/?tab=comments#comment-678 EMBED CODE

Calligraphy Mirror- Kiss of a dagger 07/14/2019 Title: Calligraphy Mirror- Kiss of a dagger Artist: me Original Posting https://aalbc.com/tc/blogs/entry/194-richard-murray-creative-table/page/5/?tab=comments#comment-574 EMBED CODE

Summer Bank Centennial PostCard/Wellington Wells 08/10/2018 My Wellington Wells We happy few postcard entry is set. Do you know the references? The competition still has time to submit if you are interested. https://www.deviantart.com/hddeviant/art/Summer-Bank-Centennial-PostCard-Wellington-Wells-758711598?ga_submit_new=10%3A1533870702 Original Posting https://aalbc.com/tc/blogs/entry/194-richard-murray-creative-table/page/4/?tab=comments#comment-441 EMBED CODE

Me Maplelized 08/08/2018 I finished the Maple Story MApleize me contest entry. Enjoy the coloring pages to my entry, if you are part of my email newsletter. If you go for it, you still have a solid day in time, please share. Here is the link to my entry. https://www.deviantart.com/hddeviant/art/Me-Maplelized-758393673?ga_submit_new=10%3A1533699970 For the record, the following link is to my original informing to the contest https://aalbc.com/tc/blogs/entry/194-richard-murray-creative-table/?page=4&amp;tab=comments#comment-437 Original Post https://aalbc.com/tc/blogs/entry/194-richard-murray-creative-table/page/4/?tab=comments#comment-439 EMBED CODE

A WHITE HOUSE CAROL 12/02/2016 assumed, may be earlier- I didn't note the exact date A White House Carol From Richard Murray In the morning and afternoon, in Christmas eve, in the year two thousand and seventeen: tweets, blogs, news anchors, or other modern media personnel utter out variances to President Trump; the year, is near complete, when the President try to climb above: rigid governing party line, violent tribalism, backstabbing factions, or other negative partitioning structures throughout humanity; but he fail in making positive partitioning structures, while ever increasing problems generate from the early or hopeful deals; now, dedicate to making a deal that will win all, he is in his bad alone; demand from his doctor can not be ignore; he stay awake while the moon peer in his temporary home and eventually he fall into sleep, and the clock strike ten. ... Trump feel a pinch on his left foot, and shuffle; easy to incense, he notice a light figure and look to call the secret service. "Why do you modern presidents always do that" Trump expect to hear a voice through the phone; none arrive after many button are press, and he calm his nerves; his eye set to the light figure, and he notice a human visage; he cry out to his guard. "I have all night, which is as long as you want it" "Don't hurt me" "You have already hurt yourself... but I am here to guide you" Trump collect his thoughts and say: "who are you?" "Monroe... James Monroe" Trump think for moments "You had us align chronologically in the hall, sequentially I am between Madison and Quincy Adams" Trump still ponder "That does not matter, do you have an idea to why I am here" "Not at all, really... I really don't" "I am here to warn you" "Warn me about what?!" The eyelids from the light figure close and it grimace extremely "It is amazing how the living is free from the pain absent time while treasuring a handful from moments in their life" Trump is in disconnect or confuse. Monroe turn round and set his back to Trump. Trump jump out from his bed to the door, witnessing creatures eat the entire backside from James Monroe. "Do not fear them Trump, but heed their warning!" "And what is that... Monroe" "The harshness that your eventuality can bring" "Listen, I don't understand, I really do not comprehend" "Of Course you do not, none of us did..." Monroe turn to the window and a loud shriek come into the room. "What was that!" "That was Jackson" "Andrew Jackson, I don't believe it, he was a great president" "Great... yes, he was great, but you confuse great to good, you see his deals, domination, expansions, and you see power, prestige, but side that was cruelty, treachery, sinful pride, a hardness that never bent... and so he bends now... look!" Trump go onto his bed and hide under sheets "You can not hide from the truth" Trump, encase in covers, is raise above the bed; he cry out: "what are you doing?!" "Nothing... you still do not see" The cover about Trump is peel away and a thing, pull his arms out, while in the air; and, pull his eyelids back; he shrieks seeing Andrew Jackson bent like a taco being burn or frozen in various places. "Do you see now Trump..." Monroe point to another place and Trump is place there. In terror Trump say: "Who is that!" "It is John Tyler... do you recall him" Trump turn away and say:"no" "He made a choice to betray those whom he was supposed to stand by, instead he tried to appease those that did not like him and in that imbalance, as you can see, many people were tore apart from those that was part to who they were, now he has to continually tear at his body, bands from one side to the other" Trump squeeze his eyes shut after hearing Tyler cry louder; the spirit tear at itself, left hand to right torso or right hand to left torso, tearing roughly while skin fall or blood spill. Trump is set down. "Am I in hell?" "Calm yourself, you are alive and getting a chance to make your passed time better, you are not in hell" "But I don't get this at all... did my predecessor have a night like this" "Yes" "Why didn't he say something?" "Would you had listened or had any respect to the man" Trump look down "Of course now, besides you don't see the cause to this" "What is the cause!" "The presidency itself, the position like all powerful chairs binds whomever sit in it. Some chairs let you dream the lies you made or keep you isolated side your biggest failure... this chair torments you using your errors" Monroe approach Trump and offer, the mortal, a comfort or pat on the back. Trump jitter nervously. "Don't you see, none of us can manipulate you, only guide you hoping you will see what you have to do and I see you will have a long night... to that end you will be visited tonight by three ghosts: purpose, community, truth and it is time for me to go" "But wait Monroe, if you always do this, why not come earlier" "I do not always do this" "But why come here then, you are not my ancestor... why not Washington" "It is simple, you are most like me... like you, I wanted to bring Columbia back to what I thought was a greater time... I did not see, how many were hurt from cruel people I empowered through my plan to bring everyone together. I learned that uniting all peoples can not occur on one people's terms or ... or... you get these creatures knowing at all I don't see including my own reverse... if any of us match a new president, the chair choose us to warn you on Christmas Eve" Monroe suddenly yell and scream; the creatures are bigger on her back while, a thing, lift him to beyond the window, about his peer. Trump go to the window and in horror see Abraham Lincoln; the father to the Republican party melting away from a blob like thing emanating form his skull; he notice Monroe is set face up while the creatures attach to a void; he call out to Monroe, but the pain overtook the spirit. Trump step back and notice the thing whose own skin is trying to suffocate it is Thomas Jefferson; he only notice through a moment to normal as the skin grow back and peel off into the mouth from Jefferson. Trump turn and jump into bed. "Mad spirit... bah humbug, that is the stupidest thing ever, I will find out who did this and they will pay" The light dim and return to the state before, while the: howls, yells, or screams fade. "I need a drink... some nice egg nog" And Trump put on his slippers and prepare to travel the hallway; he open the door and people are sitting all about on a lawn. Trump rush to go back into the room and close the door. "Donald Trump!": announce a booming voice; again, it speak the same. Trump run to his bed, slippers on, and hide under the cover; after moments, he hear a voice say: "you can not evade me, my purpose is clear" ; and some grab the covers and pull them off him. Trump sense bright light and know his room is not present; he say: "please don't hurt me" The voice gently say: "Monroe told you the truth and you can not stop this so the harder you make my situation, the longer and more painful it will be for you" Trump open his eyelids and see the lawn where people sit, surround his bed; he ask worryfull: "who are you?" A voice from a person standing behind a podium in a distance speak:"come here and you will learn" Trump walk between two long columns in a narrow isle, not a seat empty, every face look to him; a little fatigue he try to see, looking to the horizon, where any row end; but none seem to end. "Come on Trump... you can make it, you walked far less than this" Trump reach the podium and the man put out his hand. "Welcome Trump, I am William Henry Harrison, your ghost of Christmas purpose" "I don't recall your presidency" "Yes, most do not know of it. I caused my death in a place like this" "Assassination" "Well, yes, through natural forces... they were the bullet, the gun was my love to speaking" "I am a pretty good motivator" "... well, remember that essay in the New York Times" "Listen, I spoke the truth" "Ha ha ha... yes, you spoke as you saw fit, the most truthful intention... but not the truth in the scenario" "Ok listen, I am a pretty smart guy, where is my past, where is that woman that I mistreated... who I grew up with" "Ha... yes, you still do not see. This is not Dicken's fable. this is real. you were given a choice already, a choice in every moment in your life, but you failed to choose positively to yourself side others, usually only to yourself" "I don't have to listen to this, this is ridiculous" Trump try to walk away but is unable to. "You were told, the chair has decided" "Well can I just talk to the chair then, and forego talking to you or your two friend" "No but I will help you, as talking is my skill too... this chair started when Opechanacanough" "Who!" "An old native leader... on his death bed cursed whoever led the English colonist" "But what does that have to do with the U.S.A." "Patience, please do not interrupt like that... led the English colonist to suffer the pain from all their failure as he id in his life, to his own, that English colony, Virginia, would be led from George Washington who would be the first president to the U.S.A." "So because of Virginia, the U.S.A. has to suffer?" "No because of those european... White colonists, presidents will suffer long after they think they can not" "That guy was a fool, should had used his magic to win a victory" "Magic, mathematics, science... all mean knowledge, how often has humanity used the knowledge it is modernly eager to acquire to positive use... not vain, individualistic goals that hurt others" "You do what you gotta do" "Yes a saying that seem very purposeful yet lack mentioning the sacrifice to undo what others did before" "You have said your case, is that it" "No you have some more guest" "If they are like you, this should be a cakewalk" "Why do you say that?" "You are just standing in front of this immense crowd, not great cause no one is talking, but a great crowd" "You do not see, my talking caused my death, got pneumonia, lasted for a few weeks, from my own memory" "So the chair is unfair to punish you" "No, when you accept a chair like this, the time spent is irrelevant, and my punishment is my mouth, every time I talk another person is added, the columns or rows grow, I am surrounded by all the possibilities my pride or vanity did not allow" "These people are not people you know" "No, they are people my lack of purpose did not make happen. And that is my point to you Trump. Be purposeful, vain advertisements do nothing except lead to a quicker death" A person in the front row get up. Trump shuffle frightingly. Harrison say: "remember" as he side Trump are surround from the former sitters; they brush past Trump but the first one nearest Harrison hit the ghost in the face; and the mob assault Harrison through: rips, pulls, hits, bites, kicks; they each hit any part to the body they can access while Harrison wail. Trump see people at the horizon in every angle, riotous; he step back in fear to the refrigerator in the kitchen; it take moments for him to cognize his position; he open the refrigerator door, hurrying, and lift liquor to his lips. A door open and Trump cry out: "please leave me be" "Sir": say a secret service agent. "Oh... I apologize Jim... Listen, can you walk me back to my room" "Of course Mr. President... is everything all right" "Yes... lets walk... how is your family" "They are fine sir, we will enjoy tomorrow, got a good surprise for the kids" "Good, good... well listen, come with me into my room" "Sir, step back, give me a moment" The secret service agent communicate to others as Trump stand in the hall way; Trump watch him go into the room; Trump notice a secret service man in front to him, suddenly. "It is okay sir": say a secret service agent behind Trump, startling him. The door to Trump room open and Jim usher the President in. "Do you want me to stay in the room sir" "Yes Jim" Trump go into his bed, and relax, certain no spirit will make itself known, now that a guard is present; he slowly rest or relax; before he can nod off he hear a tap; he try to ignore his fear and hear more taps. Trump open his eyelids and see a man he cognize tapping Jim. "Herbert Hoover" "Yes, I am glad you know me" "You were a winner and it is nice knowing you are similar to me" "Not in personal terms Trump. I was an engineer, a fiscal operator who never went bankrupt on fiscal maturity. Did you ever think to learn architecture, or engineering a building construction?" Trump is frustrate: "then what do we have in common" "We both believe... had faith in business, in individuality overcoming collective woes, especially in this country, we are both businessmen" "We are both right" "This is not about right or wrong Trump, it is a curse, and we both do not or at least I never saw the truth. Fiscal prosperity, growth benefited us both personally, made life seem like a win if only government get out of the way, as in your bankruptcy, I did not see how greater fiscal allowance never gained the collective value but only disempowered the fiscally poor more" "That stance on prohibition was a bad call" "Yes, but one I made, cause like you, I talked community only in spirit, not in function and in trying to favor government responsibility in the cultural aspects I neglected many who never had the means to fly or allowed by their fellows to do so... efficiency... efficiency to the enabled is blocked by the successful inefficient" "So your my ghost to Christmas community" "Yes" Jim suddenly fall and break into pieces. "It is alright, your friend is safe, just a scare tactic, but it is not for you" Trump is in a puzzlement while Hoover bend over and slowly progress to the floor. "Are you still here Trump?!" "Yes... oh god, oh god your blind" "I can not see you any more, or feel your skin... as you may guess my pain is to hurt form what I can not stop, hinder, or prepare to" Trump watch Hoover crawl on the broken pieces, that is Jim, blood dripping and yet unable to cry out or feel the shards position. Trump turn away from the horror, kneeling to pray or bed or wail. Thunder sound, wind howls all about Trump; he rise from a kneeling position on the white house lawn; a man appear before him; and he say:"you are not death or the ghost of Christmas future" "No, I am your ghost of Christmas truth" "And what is your pain?" "Simple to see truth, totally throughout my soul, unable to discard or hide it" "Well what do you want to talk about, certainly not my essays or finance" "As you have guessed, your campaign" "What happened is in the past, aren't you here to give me a chance to be better, if I can't escape the curse, why do this" "You still do not see... like you I did not see truth. I saw signs the rules from my past or in my present were cracking, and I lied to myself about what needed to be done. In the end my actions to maintain order or justice led to alot of pain" "Well, can I go now" "I hope you see, your post mortem pain is inescapable, but if you lessen it, you may make the wait easier" "The wait, to what!" "To the destruction of the chair, which can only happen when Opechanacanough's curse is satisfied" "But from all the talk I heard tonight from you lame spirits, no deal is possible" "Your wrong... we may get lucky and a truly positive or great leader may arrive or..." "Or what" "Or the U.S.A. falls, absent a community to govern the chair is nothing" "Well, that will not happen in my lifetime!" "The truth is, I do not know but I saw quite a few presidents before you and... you give me hope" A complete lightness totally surround Trump or the spirit. Trump ponder, looking round. "This is energy from the chair" "I thought evil was black" "You know already, evil come in all colors... and I leave you to what you wanted an audience too" "Wait! I get to go home yes... I really got work to do" "You must stay" The spirit begin to fade. "Who are you?!" "You can call me Pierce... never forget, acting against the truth will lead to fire, unconsumable fire to the chair" The spirit, name Pierce, merge into the lightness. Trump feel hear as the lightness approach; his hand burn as it get closer and he scream and scream and scream... and wake while the sun beam on his face. Trump sit up silent or disquiet; he wonder to his guest and is startle when his Christmas day breakfast come in. Later, in the morning, Kelly Anne Conway is about to start the morning tweet plan when she is halt from President Trump; and he say: "It is time to speak to the press about my new plan"; she ask:"What is the basics?"; and he reply... The Beginning Check out my ebooks- the free one is noted, please read/enjoy/give me your response: Sunset Children Stories: https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/sunset-children-stories Looking West and West: https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/looking-west-and-west Janidogo: https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/the-janidogo The Gospel of Joseph: https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/gospel-of-joseph The Nyotenda FREE : https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/the-nyotenda Includes a comic. The following link is an excerpt LINK Original Post https://aalbc.com/tc/blogs/entry/133-a-white-house-carol/

BETTERING AMERICAN POETRY ANTHOLOGY entry 11/14/2015 Title:Harlem - June to November 2015 I am a child to Earth living side my peer, in a concentration in a night, I see... not from the Sun, many moon, shining ... many voice yell in the sky no horn or four horseman ride remind, a faint glimpse to a god kicking a free moon by know why, not I Out from the quiet Harlem Where the trees recall yesterday South from the modern Where the lights shine away... from the old song in the street Is a raccoon family Waiting for sapiens to segregate Tis a wait insane Waiting for: fish fry, jass, or roof... parties Them can not survive: mixing, security, or real estate But a darkling notice the scene He provide a path in the shade Just to a few from Harlem past... to find the Black Bath Walking outside, I ponder, where is wisdom, when the Sun can not wake me to see it, and... what can be seen from apartment 2B? concrete sequoia, surround every pane, even the baby thrush, needing parental sustenance, can't be known, and... we all ask, where with all is hope?... can I know in 9C? can enlightenment be, where no butterfly roam, even if I live or write every poem?... may I live near 2B... only down the hall, where you live in 4U, and maybe you can see or know, if you own, a pane or more from hope... will it sing, to my craft, as I walk... apartmentless, in the public dark The Trees or the Churches, are all that will stand Where is the tree that remember the land Does a church know where, the skulls from the first, was planted The collages from modern mancraft is disorganized, most ignorant I heard from one collagent ... The Pigeon who climbed a whole hill do not forget a sky never needing, to walk to one again ... do not forget an earth while sleeping to fly truly fly... to a rose beyond any sky do not forget a time when two sunflower , grow at first glance for one grow a short... distance yet, the shades them can not see prove:sky, earth, or time in chiaroscurhyme and!...this dummy still stand! pondering a turncoat dove ponderance I am comforted in knowing their finiteness though, I know a clear sadness for the collages everborn pretelling I will never know where stand the skulls, or the land What if a green speak to you one day do you think, it will speak to Giants colored grey or multicolor dirt from an annual day I say they are not signs... from the urban green not like those southern trees who know the bloodiest luxiery A salvadoran Rose, through my mind, once spoke to me We look at each other through a lens that is the moon after in the afternoon, a bluejay hope to find hopping up the fire escape to the top floor, why?! a rainforest on the third, or higher than Everest on the roof or maybe a query from the terrace fleur How do you find a place beyond time, is it galaxy wide, or smaller than an eye? Does a green, the Moon, or an avian know where it hide In a deep autumn night I think, what deep thought from those once cargo or more than likely, threw off did they saw life as hope, or a wrought did they trusted in nature, used her time as I have born in summer, a plethora from light... this fall beginning I was unwised, lived on the obvious prismal abuse suddenly pondering, why I suddenly dream to you you are not in a thought yesterday think yesterday has nothing from you? now nearest to the future what will winter be, these questions do you feel the sunlight when i do do you feel the rain are you surround between the night stars do you block their speak ... or the mirror to chaotic reality... silent fantasy from Richard Murray 2015 Check out my ebooks- the free one is noted, please read/enjoy/give me your response: Sunset Children Stories: https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/sunset-children-stories Looking West and West: https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/looking-west-and-west Janidogo: https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/the-janidogo The Gospel of Joseph: https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/gospel-of-joseph The Nyotenda FREE : https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/the-nyotenda Includes a comic. The following link is an excerpt LINK If you are willing to support me with $1 a month, that is $12 a year, I have a subscription on Deviantart. Deviantart is a website for artists but anyone can use it like Patreon or Onlyfans https://www.deviantart.com/hddeviant/tier/Tip-Jar-to-HDdeviant-902770076 oriignal post https://aalbc.com/tc/blogs/entry/113-bettering-american-poetry-anthology-entry/

Jaeger 06/12/2028 Okay, here is my Jaeger submission. I had three conceptsm first which i liked alot but didn't really fit the narrative was Old Jaeger Park. The second was the Legendary Central Park Five, whose story I wrote, and comic, whosei did not finish. The last idea was a superway. In each idea, i wanted to do something else with JAegers, old used Jaegers/another kind of interwoven wireless neurological system using also history revisioning, and lastly, just another kind of city. In the films, like most big mecha or being films, cities seem designed ignorant to these things running around that will create damage. so, instead of a regular city, what if New York City has a run way, or walk way, that is above the street mostly, sidewalk somewhat, and thus Jaeger can use it to travel fare more easily through the city. This also coincide to my particular Jaeger, the Parkour Jaeger, yes, not a well thought of name. But, the idea is this Jaeger has joints that allow for more comlicated acrobatic movement than other Jaeger. Most Jaeger are designed on the human body but when you are facing things that are reptilian or insect in variance, i think you need more flexibility. the ability to turn through momemtum three hundred and sixty degrees. Thus, the nodes you can see in the image, are as large as the limbs, they make the Jaeger taller than average but also allow for that flexibility. In the image, the ParkRei Jaeger... better name right?... is holding on to a section of the superway while it flicked another Jaeger whose beam cannon tip we see at the top. I could had colored but I wanted to really focus on my inking as it connect to other plans going forward. The other element in the rules was to depict a place where you live. I took photos for reference all about new york city. For the Old Jaegers I took for a local park. For, the legendary central park five i took empir estate building or world trade. For Old Jaeger park or Legendary Central PArk five i didn't have the photos I liked. i needed another angle for reference, especially as I had wrote up the concept. But for the last one, ParkRei, i used rockefeller center. The structure of Rockefeller center worked in terms of my vision. It has a central urban feel while also some true space to get the angle i liked. Well for my emailers, you will have image stills. For all look to the creating videos below, yes I am still getting used to being recorded while I draw, angle wise. The official submission is in my deviantart page. Enjoy, i wonder what ideas you have. Development videos part1 https://photos.google.com/b/116457345954364049850/album/AF1QipMlgm4ZrJBANbLMQ96eN21sSgxD1ZMycF9HoOY0/photo/AF1QipNJ4BpEYDumGd4hNFPnneEF8-loPXrkIsMV9Onx part2 https://photos.google.com/b/116457345954364049850/album/AF1QipMlgm4ZrJBANbLMQ96eN21sSgxD1ZMycF9HoOY0/photo/AF1QipP4azkVA2IPqDxV_0OgYXlR5lQksZ8RRAVGuTM7 part3 https://photos.google.com/b/116457345954364049850/album/AF1QipMlgm4ZrJBANbLMQ96eN21sSgxD1ZMycF9HoOY0/photo/AF1QipO4WtTc7fJ-pJqyVYkuOy52B2GEWYJ3lV0olbaM part4 https://photos.google.com/b/116457345954364049850/album/AF1QipMlgm4ZrJBANbLMQ96eN21sSgxD1ZMycF9HoOY0/photo/AF1QipMQZnJTsDGvm4l6bIFC-MUVBNz2EYO4bzJmmI8I DeviantArt Submission https://hddeviant.deviantart.com/art/ParkRei-Pacific-Rim-Jaeger-Submission-749463275?ga_submit_new=10%3A1528836929 I wish more had joined me:) I will see you next time Original post https://aalbc.com/tc/blogs/entry/194-richard-murray-creative-table/page/3/?tab=comments#comment-409 EMBED CODE

Onmyoji 06/05/2018 Ok, I learned about the Onmyoji contest on friday. While going to deviantart to look at some entries for the Jaeger contest. Well, having no knowledge to the online massive multiplayer game Onmyoji, and little time to conceptualize what my entry will be, I came up with the following. https://hddeviant.deviantart.com/art/Onmyoji-submission-emma-and-the-seven-748288623 The idea was the character emma aside seven deadly sins. I am content for such a hurried creation while having no thoughts to the content. In contrast, I am a fan to gundam, or mechas in general so the jaeger comes with more familiarity for me. In a prior post, I utilized links to my skydrive storage area, but i realized upon more videos that a space limit is inevitable. Thus, i had to figure out where to go to place the stores. I chose google photos. Instagram or snapchat are used for personal purposes. I know artists in that system but usually they focus on photos not videos. Laslty, google photos space is the largest. AALBC is my blog place, and I invite you all to join AALBC, especially if you are artist. But, the black owned website, has obvious limits to loading content like videos. Below are links to videos made as I sketched or created. My first time doing so many, and especially while drawing. Another learning experience. If you are seeing this in an email, the photos stages are attached at the end. If you are seeing this in AALBC, the videos are all their is. ...before the links to the Onmyoji videos , here is a link to the Jaeger contest which end in seven days. I invite you all to share any ideas you may have to that. https://go.deviantart.com/journal/The-Pacific-Rim-Uprising-Global-Jaeger-Contest-744541834 Do tell me if the links are blockaded, they are supposed to be public. Onmyoji-Fan-Art-Contest-Creation (1) https://photos.app.goo.gl/nW0odvDqiOuoW0R03 Onmyoji-Fan-Art-Contest-Creation (2) https://photos.app.goo.gl/RrdyWvyoJV07cLjt2 Onmyoji-Fan-Art-Contest-Creation (3) https://photos.app.goo.gl/P3FCCHJQZjQh5mhG3 Onmyoji-Fan-Art-Contest-Creation (4) https://photos.app.goo.gl/UnRC54SQJZYMf80k1 Onmyoji-Fan-Art-Contest-Creation (5) https://photos.app.goo.gl/mLkeakVn11ZiS5nF2 Onmyoji-Fan-Art-Contest-Creation (6) https://photos.app.goo.gl/bhHi7wbFG6XJVE3i8 onmyoji-fan-art-contest-creation-part2 (1) https://photos.app.goo.gl/rRnc6ZxWERa9EY4V2 onmyoji-fan-art-contest-creation-part2 (2) https://photos.app.goo.gl/yNojWgufIqFNJVbC2 onmyoji-fan-art-contest-creation-part2 (3) https://photos.app.goo.gl/Jo9T6xeLZTewubky2 onmyoji-fan-art-contest-creation-part2 (4) https://photos.app.goo.gl/VCP3PtNBAeTpXeHb2 onmyoji-fan-art-contest-creation-part2 (5) https://photos.app.goo.gl/KsmDiPPcjd9rxtJN2 onmyoji-fan-art-contest-creation-part2 (6) https://photos.app.goo.gl/hvCI58LxBb92ge4U2 onmyoji-fan-art-contest-creation-part3 (2) https://photos.app.goo.gl/3vNwF9x7iowBOUm03 onmyoji-fan-art-contest-creation-part3 (3) https://photos.app.goo.gl/S3ZlhhTTuTDdBRw12 onmyoji-fan-art-contest-creation-part3 (4) https://photos.app.goo.gl/uyoEcd9Mq8M5nDj29 onmyoji-fan-art-contest-creation-part3 (5) https://photos.app.goo.gl/01GHnNcGc4wuojpr1 onmyoji-fan-art-contest-creation-part3 (6) https://photos.app.goo.gl/TtLsnDtYVNMvbeVL9 onmyoji-fan-art-contest-creation-part3 (7) https://photos.app.goo.gl/ryKTzb9eCrDyVN5z1 onmyoji-fan-art-contest-creation-part3 (8) https://photos.app.goo.gl/Qurjw6pK3hxhcvZk2 onmyoji-fan-art-contest-creation-part3 (9) https://photos.app.goo.gl/EF2M5ynf8RzO33Bs1 The Folder Link https://photos.app.goo.gl/mZJ2RICfACZaSgtD2 Happy creating original posting https://aalbc.com/tc/blogs/entry/194-richard-murray-creative-table/page/3/?tab=comments#comment-403

Charity Coloring Book This is for the coloring book project from the charity guild group on deviantart, mine is at 1:48+5:27 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xTInog0-EqE if you are in deviantart , join the charity group i have felt very good about all the projects I have been apart of... many people talk about doing good, well here is a group that literally gets artists to do good. These coloring books will go to a bunch of kids who need all the positivity they can muster; https://www.sickkids.ca/ https://www.deviantart.com/goldenemotions/journal/Colouring-Book-Wrap-Up-1112011528 My image https://www.deviantart.com/hddeviant/art/Colouring-page-for-charity-sickkids-of-canada-2024-1054223177 EMBED CODE

Bloody Mary from Lucy Worsley https://www.pbs.org/video/bloody-mary-eldwhl/ VIDEO PREVIEW https://www.pbs.org/video/bloody-mary-her-earliest-portrait-ngd8gk/ TRANSCRIPT ♪ Lucy Worsley, voice-over: London, the 1st of October, 1553. The next monarch of England is preparing to be crowned. For the first time, the country will be ruled by a woman-- Mary I... [Thunder] ♪ but this monarch will be remembered not as a pioneer, but as a monster. ♪ In her 5-year reign, hundreds are killed in the name of religion, earning her the label Bloody Mary, but does England's first queen really deserve her reputation as one of Britain's most evil tyrants? ♪ In this series, I'm reinvestigating some of the most dramatic and brutal chapters in British history. Oh, yes. Here we go, Man: And now you're face to face with William the Conqueror. Woman, voice-over: They know that sex sells and that violence sells. Worsley, voice-over: These stories form part of our national mythology. They harbor mysteries that have intrigued us for centuries... Worsley: It turns very dark here. Clearly showing us-- Refugees. There's such graphic images of religious violence. Worsley, voice-over: but with the passage of time, we have new ways to unlock their secrets using scientific advances and a modern perspective. He was what we would now call a foreign fighter. Worsley, voice-over: I'm going to uncover forgotten witnesses. I'm going to reexamine old evidence and follow new clues... The human hand. Worsley, voice-over: to get closer to the truth. It's like fake news. Worsley: You're questioning whether we can actually take that seriously as a piece of evidence. ♪ Worsley, voice-over: Hampton Court Palace-- family home of England's original Tudor queen, daughter of Henry VIII-- Mary I. She walked these cloisters and lived in these rooms. There are echoes of Mary's presence here, but the real Mary seems lost in history. Worsley: Mary was England's first crowned female monarch, and this meant she had to create a whole new role-- the role of queen regnant, or ruling queen-- and Mary created a blueprint that all the queens to come would follow, from Elizabeth I to Victoria to Elizabeth II. I think of Mary as a female trailblazer, but she's all too often remembered as a bloody tyrant. ♪ Worsley, voice-over: During Mary's 5 years in power, more than 280 people were killed for their faith. Her reputation seems sealed, but Mary lived in a divided time, and, as a historian, I know there's always more than one side to a story, so I want to look at Mary afresh through different eyes-- her supporters', her enemies', and Mary's own-- to examine how she navigated ruling as a woman and if Bloody Mary is really how she deserves to be remembered. ♪ I'm starting my investigation with a very rare glimpse of Mary as a child. Worsley: "Special Collections." Worsley, voice-over: In the stores at the National Portrait Gallery, I'm hoping to be able to come face to face with the young princess. Here are some exciting-looking little boxes. Worsley: voice-over: I'm here to see what's thought to be the earliest portrait miniature produced in England. The art form's intended to give a sense of intimacy. It's an image of Mary dating to 1522. There she is. There she is. Can I touch? Yeah. Ah. Ah, thank you. You're very welcome. Yeah. It's Mary. Yeah. Incredible level of details. She's got really red hair, hasn't she... Yeah. She does. like you'd expect from Henry VIII's daughter. It's such a precious-feeling little thing, and it's 500 years old. Yes. Worsley, voice-over: I'm interested in what this painting reveals about Mary's status. The gallery's state-of-the-art microscope might give me an even closer look. Worsley: It's just fantastic. You can see the individual flakes of the paint. ♪ Worsley, voice-over: When this portrait was made, Mary was a much-loved 6-year-old. ♪ Worsley: This was painted for a special reason, and the clue to what that was-- there it is--it's down here. You can see that on her dress, she's wearing a brooch, a golden brooch, and it says on it in tiny letters, "The Emperor," so this is one of the European rulers. It's the Emperor Charles V, and the picture's been painted because Mary's just been engaged to him. This is the fate of a princess. She's like a little chess piece that her father is using to play the game of European politics. ♪ Worsley, voice-over: The Mary I'm seeing here had her whole future mapped out, but then in her teens, everything changed. ♪ Here we have Henry VIII... and he's married to Catherine of Aragon from Spain, a very devout Catholic. Poor Catherine had a whole series of miscarriages, stillbirths, children who died young. Their daughter Mary was the only one of their children to survive. Worsley, voice-over: But Henry was desperate for a male heir. He and Catherine had not had the all-important son, so he wanted a divorce to marry Anne Boleyn. In 1533, he got his way by splitting from Rome and the Catholic Church, opening the door to the English Protestant Reformation and dividing the country. ♪ Mary was now declared illegitimate. At 17, she was stripped of her royal title and threatened with death as a traitor for her beliefs. ♪ She would come to define her life by her Catholic faith and her right to the throne. ♪ This sounds like a woman with immense self-confidence, and I'm curious about her journey from outcast to queen. I'm heading to Framlingham in Suffolk, where Mary would make some crucial decisions 6 years after her father's death. ♪ Mary had been Henry's eldest child. Then came Elizabeth, followed by Henry's longed-for son Edward. On Henry's death, 9-year-old Edward inherited the throne, but he would die as a young teenager. Aged 37, Mary could now claim her right to the crown. ♪ Now, there'd never been a ruling queen in England before. There had been queens, but they'd been the wives of kings. Unlike some of the countries of Europe, though, there was nothing in English law to stop there being a female ruler. Technically, at least, Mary could go right ahead and take the throne. ♪ Worsley, voice-over: But King Edward had been influenced by powerful Protestant nobles. On his deathbed, he bypassed Catholic Mary and declared a distant cousin, the Protestant Lady Jane Gray, as his successor. To win her crown, Mary would need to fight, and on the 12th of July, 1553, she came here to her castle at Framlingham to rally support for her cause. ♪ Worsley: The stakes couldn't have been higher for Mary at this moment. If her attempt to seize the throne failed, she'd either have to go into exile or if, they caught her, she'd be executed as a traitor. ♪ Worsley, voice-over: I'm meeting a specialist in Tudor relationships who believes that applying modern analysis to old evidence might reveal Mary's tactics. Melita, we're sitting on the spot of what was once the Great Hall of Framlingham Castle. There's bits of Tudor walls up there. I think we can imagine Mary spending some anxious hours in here thinking, "Who's on my side?" Can you tell me a bit more about your research into Mary's network? Yes. I've been doing what's called social network analysis, so I've put together--and I'm still working on it-- it's a massive database of all of the connections that Mary had to different people. My goodness, it looks like a Spirograph. Yes. Is that Mary right in the middle? It is Mary, right in the center. So, Melita, are we looking at the Tudor version of LinkedIn? That's it, absolutely. Yes. Now, the different colors of connection represent different things. OK. Green represents an award, so it's a grant of office. We've got also purple lines, and that's gifts in a more tangible sense, so jewelry or quite often clothing or fruit. We've got quite a lot of records from her Privy Purse expenses from in the 1530s and '40s. She's given an awful lot of gifts, hasn't she? Mary was very generous. And is this how you build up a following if you want to be a powerful Tudor person? Exactly, yes, because the trick is, you always wanted them to be slightly grateful to you. Oh, there's a Framlingham filter in the program. Yes, and we can see who supported Mary immediately. Now, two in there you can see with little red spots, they were actually members of Edward's Privy Council, and yet they were immediate supporters of Mary. And if you click on Richard Southwell, we can see-- That over a period of years, he and Mary have exchanged gifts... Yes. Oh. and she's given him more than he's given her. Oh, yes, so she has kind of... Cultivated. cultivated him. Oh, you've got a filter that's actually called Defected to Mary, brilliant. Look at it doing its thing. It's amazing. So one of the people who defected to her was Henry Fitzalan, Earl of Arundel. His first wife had been one of her ladies in waiting, and of the men who support her in 1553, you can often see that there are relationships through their wives and their sisters. So it's interesting that she's built up friendships with the females of this family and they bring over their male relatives. Yes. I think we can definitely see a connection between family pressure through women's networks. Was it presumably Catholics who were the fastest in coming forwards? Catholics were definitely amongst her core supporters, but she also had Protestants because she was the legitimate heir. The Mary you're talking about sounds like she's friendly. She's generous. She's well-connected. She's somebody who knows how to build loyalty. I think she had the gift of friendship, and Mary's a lot more fun than people give her credit for. Really? She loved to dance. She loved to hunt. She did archery. She knew in her heart that she was a queen, and I think that was another element, her self-belief and her determination. She said, "I'm queen, and I'm gonna be queen, and I'm gonna absolutely insist on my rights." She was a politician to the tips of her royal fingers. Absolutely. Worsley, voice-over: It strikes me that Mary had no hope of seizing the throne without her quite considerable emotional intelligence. She needed to win hearts and minds to her side. There's no sign of the cold-hearted tyrant here. Worsley: This was a woman who was sociable. She was generous. This was a leader who people wanted to follow, and follow Mary they did. ♪ Worsley, voice-over: In July 1553, Mary gathered hundreds of her supporters here, ready and willing to fight for the throne. ♪ In the end, no battle was needed. ♪ The tide of support had turned in Mary's favor, so the Protestant nobles conceded defeat. Mary had thrown off years of bitter persecution and rallied a country behind her to win the throne, but she would now have to deal with the rituals of royalty, which were, until this moment, made for men. [Bells ringing] ♪ Nearly 500 years ago, on the 1st of October, 1553, Mary walked down this very aisle in Westminster Abbey to be crowned. Mary was at the front of this whole long procession of her knights and her counselors and her dukes. She did have some ladies with her, but the focus was all on Mary herself. For the first time at a coronation, a woman was leading the men. [Men singing Gregorian chants] Worsley, voice-over: But a coronation designed for kings presented some problems for the first queen. Her coronation regalia included the spurs of a knight, but, unlike kings before her, Mary didn't put them on. She did receive the sword, a symbol that she was now defender of the realm. ♪ Worsley: It seems to me that Mary had a very difficult line to tread here. She almost had to blur the genders. She had to portray herself as a king for legitimacy and authority, but she also had to tear up the rule book and make the ritual suitable for a woman, and what she did would set the pattern for all the female monarchs who followed. [Choir singing] Worsley: This area up here is off limits because that mosaic is over 750 years old. It's much too fragile to be walked on, but that's the exact spot where Mary was crowned, and it's still the exact spot where monarchs are crowned to this day. At the actual moment of crowning, Mary was on the Coronation Chair-- it was placed on a platform-- and the Crown Imperial was put onto her head. ♪ Worsley, voice-over: The coronation service was a full Catholic Mass. Mary couldn't officially restore the Catholic faith until Parliament reconvened... ♪ so she was crowned Supreme Head of the Protestant Church of England. [Cheering and applause] Worsley, voice-over: The country celebrated, and there were parties in the streets of London, but within just 5 years, hundreds of ordinary people would be killed in Mary's name. ♪ The new Queen's Catholic beliefs would make her rule hugely polarizing. ♪ Naturally, as a historian, I want to interrogate this period from different angles, so I wonder what I can learn from the experience of someone living on the other side of the religious divide. This is a copy of a page from "Foxe's Book of Martyrs." Worsley, voice-over: It's an account of Mary's reign by a strongly Protestant critic. It's very one-sided-- I've got to be wary of that-- but it does give the story of a Protestant woman who found Mary's rule horrifyingly harsh. Worsley: She's referred to here as "Drivers wyfe," meaning the wife of a man called Driver. She's presented very much as his property. She was "about the age of 30 yeares," and she "dwelt at Grosborough...in Suffolke." It says that, "[h]er husband did use husbandry," which means a subsistence farmer. Then we get quite a lot more detail about what happens to her, and then here, her name was Alice. Alice Dryver. ♪ Worsley, voice-over: This young farmer's wife lived just 10 miles from Framlingham Castle, the site of Mary's triumph, but under the new regime, her faith put her at risk of execution. ♪ To get a sense of why a woman like Alice might become a threat to the Queen of England, I've come to Grundisburgh in Suffolk, where Alice lived. ♪ Here's a piece of 16th-century evidence that I think might give an insight into Alice's life here. This is Fitzherbert's "Booke of Husbandry" from 1523, and here's a section called "The Duties of Wyves." Presumably, this is the sort of thing that Alice was expected to do. "It is a wyves occupacyon to winow all manner of corne..." ♪ "in tyme of nede to helpe her husbande to fyll the mucke wayne," the muck wain being the "dounge carte"... [Rooster crows] ♪ and she also has to "dryve the plough," which sounds quite masculine, actually-- a bit surprised about that-- and she also has "to go...to the markette to sell the butter, "the chese, the mylke, the egges, the chekens, the hennes, the pygges." That sounds like a pretty hard life with a lot of hard labor in it, long hours, I guess. ♪ Worsley, voice-over: At the heart of village life when Alice lived here was the church, and Alice would likely have worshiped in this very building nearly 500 years ago. ♪ Look at these amazing angels on the roof with their big wings. ♪ Now, Alice, extraordinarily, would have been here in the service with them up above her. ♪ Worsley, voice-over: This church building would have been a constant in Alice's life, but the religion practiced here varied. She was just 5 when Henry VIII turns this from a Catholic church to Church of England. Alice grew up in the Protestant faith, but 20 years later, it would change back again. ♪ Worsley: It was maybe here at the church that Alice learned that Queen Mary had come to the throne and that this church would once again become Catholic. ♪ Worsley, voice-over: Mary's restoration of Catholicism meant Alice would no longer be allowed to worship in here as a Protestant. She would now need to convert or risk getting into trouble. ♪ Mary herself had experienced pressure to convert. She had fought hard for her Catholic faith. Now as Queen, her drive to make the whole country Catholic set her on a collision course with Protestants across England... ♪ but those who supported Mary must have had a very different view of her reign, so I've come to Cambridge University Library in search of a source that should offer a much less familiar take on Bloody Mary-- a Spanish one. Mary was half Spanish on her mother's side. I've enlisted a Spanish historian to help me decipher this perspective. ♪ This is quite exciting, isn't it? Oh, look how dinky it is. It's like a little toy book. So there's his name, which I fear I'm going to make a terrible job of pronouncing. Will you say it for me? His name is Pedro de Ribadeneira. And he was a Spaniard who came to England? Yes. He did. He came to England in 1558. He was a Catholic priest, and he stayed in the kingdom for a few months. I am reading this. I think it says, "The virtues of the Queen." So "Delas virtudes de la Reina dona Maria" is, as you very well said, "On the virtues of Queen Mary." What are they? What are the virtues? Take me through it. Well, Ribadeneira thinks that Mary is a good Catholic who's leading her kingdom towards salvation. She respects the primacy of the Pope. She cares for her people. May I just say, he would say that, though, wouldn't he, with his Catholic perspective. Of course he is going to be seeing her in such a good light, which contrasts a lot with what other Protestant historians were writing about Mary in the 16th century. Does he give any comment about her performance once she's in the role as queen? Yes. He does indeed. The economic situation that Mary inherits is not an easy one, but from the very beginning of her reign, she decides that she's going to make changes and reforms. According to Ribadeneira, she reforms the Court of the Exchequer, and she creates a new book of rates that increases the Crown's income. So she cuts taxes, she reforms bureaucracy, and she increases crown revenues. She's doing a great job. She is indeed. We usually tend to see the beginning of Elizabeth's reign and the prosperity as something that is achieved by Elizabeth... It was achieved by Mary. but she is the one achieving it. She's the one that is setting base for that future prosperity. And how does she go about restoring Catholicism? How does she actually do that in practice? Now, she's cautious at the beginning in the sense that she doesn't want to force people. She understands that there has been a lot of upheaval, and she is very pragmatic. On this page, she is talking about how those who had acquired church land during the dissolution of the monasteries of her father's reign are being allowed to keep that land, and over, here we see that she allowed all marriages that had taken place through the Protestant rite to remain valid. You're talking as if Bloody Mary the tyrant was actually quite reasonable and sensible and pragmatic. Compared to other rulers of her time, I would say absolutely. ♪ Wasn't that fascinating to get a Spanish perspective on Mary, one that sees her as a pretty effective ruler? Now, I do concede that Ribadeneira is a partial witness. He's very pro-Catholic, pro-Mary, but he does admit that she has some flaws. There's a bit of balance there, almost as if Mary wasn't entirely good or entirely bad, almost as if she was a human being. ♪ Worsley, voice-over: According to this side of the story, at the start of her reign, Mary wanted to restore Catholicism but didn't want to use force. Protestants like Alice Dryver were left in peace for now. ♪ So if this is true, why did Mary change direction? ♪ In the summer of 1554, about 9 months into her reign, Mary got married. She needed a husband because she needed an heir... Hi there. Hey, madam. Could we go to the Spanish Embassy, please? Certainly. Belgrave Square. Thanks. Worsley, voice-over: but a man at her side could potentially undermine Mary's position as queen. ♪ Her new husband was a devout Catholic and a cousin on her mother's side-- Philip of Spain. ♪ Mary and Philip married in July 1554. Philip was the son of the emperor Charles V, ironically the very man Mary had been betrothed to as a child. ♪ Philip was heir to the Spanish throne and an enormous European empire. ♪ Even before the wedding took place, a group of Protestants mounted a rebellion to try to stop the marriage and overthrow the queen... ♪ so how does a married woman rule with authority in a traditional society where men dominate? ♪ To find out, I'm meeting an expert in 16th-century marriage treaties. ♪ Worsley: Alexander, we've got a completely unprecedented situation here. We've got Mary, a female ruler, with a male consort, and he's a foreigner, as well. Yes. How are they going to rule in practice? How's she going to make sure that he doesn't boss her about? Well, one of the key, key ways of doing that is through the stipulations that they have in their marriage contract, and here we have the copy from the National Archives of the English draft that formed the basis of the document that they both eventually went on to sign. So this is like a prenup. Exactly, yes, setting out all of the kind of legal limitations on his power and also settling her position constitutionally. This is one of my favorite clauses down the bottom-- "That the said noble prince shall nothyng do, "whereby anything be innovate in the state and right publique." So he's not allowed to make new laws or anything like that. He's not allowed to make new laws or to change anything, effectively, constitutionally particularly... Stay in your lane, Philip. so I think we can see that in this first clause here that he "shall not promote, admit, or receive "to any office, administration, "or benefice in the said realm of England "anyone who is not a natural born subject of the Queen of England." So he's not going to be allowed to put any of his own people into English jobs and positions and offices. Exactly that. He is excluding specifically powers of patronage, taking them away from Philip, ensuring that Mary retains complete control of who is in the key offices of state. There were people who saw the Spanish marriage as very dangerous. People in England did not want England to become a satellite state of this broader Hispanic monarchy, this broader European empire. For Mary, it's obviously really important that her subjects and parliament know that power will be not given away to Philip too much. Yeah. Yeah. How does she circulate that news? She has the terms declared and proclaimed to all the people of England, and in addition to this, the English Parliament passes in 1554 the Act for the Queen's Regal Power, which essentially settles constitutionally her right to rule in her own right, and so the name of king and queen are kind of made equivalent so that all legislation which refers to kings now applies to queens, and, in fact, it's the constitutional basis for Elizabeth's authority in the Elizabethan period which follows on straight from this one. ♪ Worsley, voice-over: On paper, Mary had successfully managed the power dynamic with Philip, but I've got proof that she still had something of a PR problem. ♪ For the first time in the English coinage, we've got two people on the money. There's Philip, there's Mary, and a little floating crown to show that they rule together, but you can also see the scale of the problem that she had because the person on the left in a double portrait is the person who's more dominant, and in this case, that person is Philip. A craftsman who would earn a shilling as his day's wages would get this in his hand, and he'd think, "Oh, yes, Philip and Mary. They are our rulers now." Our queen has given away her power. ♪ Worsley, voice-over: Mary's marriage had reignited anti-Catholic feeling, and, for me, Mary's marriage raises questions about her persecution of Protestants. Did her husband influence her to take a harder line, or did she feel she had to assert her authority in the face of religious division? Either way, she tightened her grip. ♪ [Bell tolls] ♪ In December 1554, Mary reintroduced heresy laws. Protestant beliefs were now punishable by death. It was an act that would come to define her reign, in large part because of a book which claims to tell us what happened next-- "Foxe's Book of Martyrs," the book where I found the story of the farmer's wife Alice Dryver. Thank you. Ooh, it's heavy. Worsley, voice-over: I wonder if seeing an original copy at Trinity College, Cambridge, can help me understand this book's power. Worsley: This is "Foxe's Book of Martyrs," and it's a history of the church going from the first century right up until the reign of Mary I. Worsley, voice-over: But this is a history book with a clear bias because John Foxe was a prominent Protestant. Worsley: What John Foxe doesn't like about Mary is her Catholicism, and at the start of her reign, he and his family went to live in exile. He was out of England when he was writing this. Let's go to the part of the book where Mary appears. Here it is, "The comming in of Queene Mary," and the whole of the rest of it, 700 pages here, are basically about the terrible things done to Protestants in her name. ♪ What makes the book so powerful, I think, are the images, the woodcuts. They're such graphic images of religious violence. This one shows a man being burnt alive at the stake, the most horrible, long-drawn-out, painful death imaginable, and you can tell he's alive, although the flames are all around him, because he's saying, "Lorde, receive my spirite," and there's a crowd, and the crowd are visibly distressed. [People screaming] ♪ Worsley, voice-over: Looking at Foxe's account, it's easy to believe that Mary was a queen on the rampage... ♪ but I think it's time for more of Mary's side of the story. ♪ There's an intriguing source from 1555 that gives some insight into her thinking at the time. ♪ This is a report to the church authorities recording the opinion of the Queen of England, "which she has written out with her own hand," so it's a record of Mary's actual words, and she says that, "Touching the punishment of heretics"-- by "punishment," she does mean burnings and executions-- she says, "[I]t would be well to inflict punishment... without much cruelty or passion," so she's emphasizing moderation. She says that she wants to target the people who deceive the simple, by which I think she means clever preachers who are out there actively spreading the Protestant message, and the punishments are to be an "example to the whole of this kingdom," so they're supposed to be a deterrent, so that's quite surprising when it comes to the burning of Protestants. Mary seems to want quite a targeted approach. ♪ Worsley, voice-over: If this is to be believed, Mary was aiming to make an example of the leaders of the faith in the hope the rest would submit, but Alice Dryver wasn't a powerful leader, just a Suffolk farmer's wife. ♪ We don't know who betrayed Alice... ♪ but "Foxe's Book of Martyrs," our main source on Alice, tells us that she and another Protestant were hiding from the authorities when they got caught. ♪ Alice was taken to the local town and imprisoned to await trial and her fate. ♪ [Gate opens] From the summer of 1555, the number of burnings across the country were ramping up. Records show they more than doubled between the first half of the year and the second. ♪ I want to understand how Mary was feeling at this point. I suspect it's not a coincidence that this was happening during a moment of personal upheaval. ♪ In the spring of 1555, Mary withdrew to her private chambers at Hampton Court. She believed she was pregnant. This child would secure Mary's line of succession and the future of Catholicism in England. ♪ These are copies of ambassadors' letters from court-- this lot are in French-- and the hot topic is the Queen's pregnancy. He's talking about "the size of her stomach and the hardening of her mamelles"-- he must mean her breasts-- "and they are distilling a liquid." I guess that might mean lactating. Poor Mary. These are really intimate details being shared, seems completely inappropriate, but I guess it's her job. She's supposed to produce the heir to the throne, so her body is public property. ♪ Worsley, voice-over: Documents from this time that Mary herself had a hand in add to the sense of joyful anticipation. ♪ Worsley: These cards-- pre-prepared, ready to be sent out to dignitaries across Europe announcing the birth when it happens-- they've been signed by "Mary the Queen"... ♪ and they announced the birth of a prince at Hampton Court... ♪ and then a gap's been left blank here just for the date to be popped in when it actually happens. The reason they're still blank is that 9 months went past and no baby came. Mary was actually experiencing a phantom pregnancy. ♪ Worsley, voice-over: To delve into this mysterious condition and the impact it would have had on Mary, I'm hoping a psychiatrist can give me a modern medical perspective. Mary I has had a phantom pregnancy. Can you tell me what that actually is in medical terms? Phantom pregnancy means false pregnancy, pseudocyesis, so it means you think you're pregnant because you see the signs and symptoms, but actually, you're not. Do you ever see this today in your practice? It doesn't seem like it's a very common condition. In Western medicine, you wouldn't typically get a case of phantom pregnancy because if you think you're pregnant, you will have a urine test to check your pregnancy. You will have a Doppler scan, ultrasound scan, a blood test, so automatically right at the start, you would know you're not pregnant. I've got something to show you. This is a medical paper from America, 1951, of a variety of cases of pseudocyesis. Oh, "A Psychosomatic Study in Gynecology," and there are "[b]reast changes...enlargement, tenderness; secretion of milky or cloudy fluid." They've mentioned here a case study where there were 27 patients who presented as pregnant, and this was confirmed in 9 of the cases by doctors. The doctors were taken in, so in relatively recent times, people were still having phantom pregnancies, 1951... Mm. and what causes it? If we like to categorize, we might think psychological or hormonal, so the psychological side, there's a variety of risk factors-- so if someone has had emotional abuse, if someone's longing to be pregnant, if someone's had difficulty getting pregnant. There's a variety of reasons. There's quite a few things that you just listed that do apply to Mary. She did have a difficult childhood. She wasn't taken care of. People threatened her with death and a huge, huge, huge amount of pressure to bear a child. Is it possible for you to speculate as to what might have happened to her after the phantom pregnancy was over, then? I imagine a great deal of distress. It must be quite frightening, actually, because she would have had a distended abdomen and she would have had these bodily changes but no understanding why that's happening. And I suppose she's lost a whole imagined future. I mean, if we think, you know, you're longing for a child, you've created a bond, and that's suddenly taken away, so I can imagine she must have felt very anxious, very low in mood, and emotionally, psychologically, it must have been absolutely dreadful to go through it. ♪ [Crying] ♪ Mary must have felt like her body had failed her, and she was 39 years old, which, in 16th-century terms, meant that her chances of getting pregnant again were diminishing very fast. ♪ Worsley, voice-over: As a woman, this would have been a huge personal trauma, but as a queen, it was a crisis. With no heir, the future of Catholic England hung in the balance. ♪ Tensions were rising. ♪ Troops were brought into London to maintain order. By 1556, a major plot against the queen was uncovered, an attempt to replace her with her Protestant sister Elizabeth. Mary was now living in fear. She was sleeping only 3 hours a night. Worsley: Mary was clearly struggling on a personal level with her mental health, her physical health, and I'm left wondering what that might have meant for her as a ruler. Was her authority still intact? Was she really able still to govern the country in the same way? ♪ Worsley, voice-over: In places like rural Suffolk, it was local authorities who wielded the power. They could decide how to enforce religious policies. ♪ The Protestant source, "Foxe's Book of Martyrs," contains a detailed account of how Alice Dryver's trial unfolded. Alice is brought to her trial at Ipswich. She would have been quite likely the only woman present. ♪ Then a lengthy theological debate begins, and during it, Alice shows that she's more than capable of standing up for herself intellectually. As she says here to the courtroom-- it's amazing, this; she just goes off onto this speech of her own-- she says, "I was an honest poore man's daughter, "never brought up in the universitie as you have bene..." ♪ ...but I have driven the plough before my father many a tyme, and I thank God. In defense of God's truth and in the cause of my master Christ, by his grace I will set my foote against the foote of any of you. Worsley, voice-over: She's standing up for herself, answering back. She will set her foot against the foot of any of these men sitting in trial upon her. It's an extraordinary moment of courage. ♪ Worsley, voice-over: Alice staunchly defended herself and her faith. ♪ She was found guilty of heresy. What strikes me reading this is that Alice and Mary weren't so very different. They were both of them women who broke the rules. They were women who did things that women weren't supposed to do, and they also had such a deep religious faith that they defended it at enormous personal cost... which is why it's so very painful that it's now in Mary's name that Alice is condemned to die. ♪ Worsley, voice-over: There's no paper trail linking Mary to Alice's fate. It was the church authorities who chose how extreme the punishment should be. ♪ On the 4th of November, 1558, Alice Dryver was burnt alive at the stake. [Alice screaming] She was one of the last people to be killed under Mary's regime because only two weeks later, on the 17th of November, Queen Mary herself died. ♪ She'd been struggling with ill health ever since her phantom pregnancy. ♪ The likely cause of death was cancer. She was 42 years old. Now her Protestant sister Elizabeth I would succeed to the throne, and I believe Mary would become the victim of a smear campaign. ♪ There's no denying the brutal religious persecutions of Mary's reign. Those Protestant accounts are based on real deaths, but at this time, Europe was bitterly divided between Catholic and Protestant, with mass killings on both sides. Henry VIII had thousands put to death in the name of religion. In Edward's reign, around 900 were killed and an estimated 600 under Elizabeth. Approximately 284 deaths are attributed to Mary. Obviously, her reign was shorter, but the numbers are pretty comparable, but it's Mary who has been vilified and dubbed a bloody tyrant, and I believe that's thanks to her enemies. This pamphlet was published in 1558. This little book by John Knox is called "The First Blast of the Trumpet Against the Monstrous Regiment of Women." John Knox really makes me see a kind of red mist because he's so massively misogynistic. He says that women, queens like Mary, are unfit to rule, "made to serve and obey man, not to rule and command him," and he thinks that women are "weake, fraile, impaciet, feble, foolishe, and cruell." Now, this isn't just about Mary's gender. John Knox was a very fiery Protestant. He was against Mary as a Catholic queen, and the way Knox sees the burning of Protestants is as a punishment to everybody for having put Mary, a woman, on the throne in the first place. ♪ Worsley, voice-over: This Protestant pamphlet was a catalyst for more vicious attacks on the reputation of the Catholic queen. It was soon after that "Foxe's Book of Martyrs" was published. In 1571, it was ordered that copies be put in every cathedral and church in the country alongside the bible. Foxe's graphic imagery and unflinching, one-sided stories of what he called the bloody time of Queen Mary now came to be seen as the gospel truth, the definitive history of the period. I wouldn't describe him as a historian. I would describe him as a propagandist and an incredibly good one. It's this book that has given Mary her reputation as a bloody tyrant. Worsley, voice-over: The long reign of Elizabeth I firmly established England as a Protestant country, and it surely suited Elizabeth that her sister be remembered as a Catholic monster. I think the smear campaign against Mary has clouded out all that was achieved by our first queen. ♪ As well as having to navigate all the problems of being a female leader in a world made for men, she was also ruling at a time of brutal religious division, and she had physical health problems and such traumatic experiences of her own to overcome, I'm just left astounded by Mary's courage and her completely underestimated political skills. She really redefined what it means to be a monarch. ♪ Worsley, voice-over: There's one final telling footnote to Mary's story here at Westminster Abbey. This is Mary's tomb, but it's shared with her sister Elizabeth, and it's Elizabeth whose effigy is on top and whose initials adorn the monument. There's an inscription right down here like a footnote, and it says that there are two queens here-- Elizabeth and Mary, "et Maria." ♪ Worsley, voice-over: But this tiny reference is the only mention of Mary on the whole tomb. Worsley: I think the tomb says a lot about how we remember Mary today. Here, she's literally overshadowed by her sister, the mighty Elizabeth I, but I think that Elizabeth was mighty not least because of what she learned from her big sister Mary. Worsley, voice-over: For too long, Mary has been misunderstood, overlooked, vilified. ♪ I think it's time we restored England's first ruling queen to her rightful place in history as a female trailblazer. ♪ ♪

Madness of King George from Lucy Worsley https://www.pbs.org/video/madness-of-king-george-jpamkt/ VIDEO PREVIEW https://www.pbs.org/video/episode-2-preview-madness-king-george-wdz8ar/ TRANSCRIPT full review [ Suspenseful music plays ] -Winter, 1788. The British king, George III, is hallucinating, violent, and abusive. -Out of my sight! ♪♪ -He's losing control -- of himself and the country. At a time of upheaval, Britain can't have a mentally ill king. ♪♪ As a last resort, a medical maverick, who runs an asylum, is summoned. ♪♪ Can he save the king? -[ Shuddering ] ♪♪ In this series, I'm reinvestigating some of the most dramatic and brutal chapters in British history. ♪♪ It wasn't just one generation. It was three generations losing their lives, bam, bam, bam. These stories are epic and legendary and they all have fascinating mysteries at their heart. It's chilling to think that this could actually be evidence in a murder investigation. ♪♪ I want to look at them from a fresh and modern perspective to try and unlock their secrets. ♪♪ It's a horrible psychosexual form of torture, this, isn't it? -Absolutely. ♪♪ -By uncovering forgotten witnesses, reexamining old evidence, and following new clues, can I get closer to the truth? -It is one of the great British mysteries. -It was one of those moments, I'm afraid, for a historian, that makes the hair stand up on the back of your neck. [ Cawing ] ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ -I'd say I know a fair bit about George III, but, I don't know nearly enough about his mental health and now's the perfect time to take a look at it because new evidence has come to light. Just a few years ago, the royal family granted unprecedented access to his personal papers. This treasure trove of documents is stored at Windsor Castle. A residence of the British royal family for more than 1,000 years. So far, 225,000 documents -- diaries, letters, medical notes -- have been published online. But there are still more secrets to be revealed. ♪♪ I've been here to the Royal Archives before, but this is the first time I hope to get my hands on documents that will take me behind the scenes, into 1788, when the king fell ill. I've asked the royal archivist to bring out a unique private diary. It's an eyewitness account of George III's illness as it escalated. -There we are. -Thank you ever so much. This is great, thanks. This is an amazing thing to get to see. It's the diary of Robert Greville, "Journal of His Majesty's most serious and afflicting illness." He was one of the king's equerries, which means he spent a lot of time with the king. And, on Sunday, the 9th of November, he's writing about, "Great agitation & much incoherence in thought & expressions." It's fascinating that he's actually with the king. This is like a frontline report from the king's bedside. What else are we going to learn? Oh, finally, he goes to sleep, after having "talked for 19 hours without scarce any intermission." ♪♪ Poor man. What's happening on November the 24th? "We found the king violently agitated and very angry, but more particularly with Dr Warren,' one of the medical advisors. "The king advanced up to him and pushed him." ♪♪ So, Greville's getting pretty upset, actually. He says that, "the general conduct of the physicians has not been...decided or firm." They simply don't know what to do. "They appear to shrink from responsibility." Greville says here that, "a report has been sent to Mr Pitt," the prime minister, "stating that [His Majesty] had passed a quiet night, but that he was entirely deranged." ♪♪ George had at least five personal doctors and they were all mystified. In the 1780s in Britain, the medical profession still clung to a centuries-old notion about mental illness. ♪♪ When George fell ill in 1788, his doctors, at first, still believed they needed to get this disease out of his body. They gave him drugs to make him vomit. They used blisters to draw out what they thought was bad blood from his body. And they used these little suckers. Got these off the Internet. I love the way they're actually called... These are leeches! Look at them wiggle. They're just like tiny, little monsters. Ooh! He's sucking the side there. And the idea was that these would be applied to George's temples and that they would suck the madness out of his brain. ♪♪ The king is bled, blistered, and purged. Nothing works. ♪♪ His baffling illness could not have struck at a worse time. ♪♪ In the 1780s, Europe is a tinderbox. Peter III of Russia has been murdered, France is on the brink of revolution, and the American colonies have all but won the war for independence. [ Thud ] ♪♪ George was ill at such a crucial time in history. Then, and since, there's been a keen interest in working out what was wrong with him. ♪♪ And it seems to me that George's illness wasn't just misunderstood in his own lifetime. ♪♪ This essay was published in the British Medical Journal in 1966. It's by a couple of psychiatrists, Macalpine and Hunter. They looked at George's medical records and argued that he had a rare genetic blood disorder called porphyria. This idea really stuck, notably, in the stage play by Alan Bennett. When this was turned into a film, there was actually a caption onscreen suggesting that George had porphyria. But, historians have been divided about this and now, there's a rival diagnosis. ♪♪ I'm going to speak to one of the UK's most eminent psychiatrists, to see if he can shed some light. He's also been examining the papers from the Royal Archives. ♪♪ Can the new evidence settle the question of what was wrong with George, once and for all? ♪♪ Simon, how do you feel about "diagnosing" dead people? There are some concerns here, aren't there? -Oh yeah, very much so. In medicine, in general, and psychiatry, it's a very dangerous thing to do. The only reason that we can do this with George is because the documentation's so extraordinary. -Why do you think that porphyria was so warmly welcomed as a theory in the 1960s? -Macalpine and Hunter were, it now turns out, ardent monarchists, and they wanted, really, to remove the taint and the stigma of mental illness from the royal family. And porphyria did run in the royal houses of Europe, by the way, it just didn't affect George. But they wanted to kind of help the queen out by taking away the taint of mental illness. -What was really the king's condition, do you think? -The best evidence we have from George is the observations of his behavior. We've had, for some time now, what we call diagnostic criteria, in which you can fill in a computer program and that will then tell you what is the most likely diagnosis. -So, you have your computer program and you can put George into it and see what comes out? -You can, indeed. -Employment: king. -Employment: king. [ Laughter ] Residence: Windsor Castle. Grandiosity. Bit difficult, in a king, to diagnose that, actually. -Excessive self-reproach. He was a great one for beating himself up. -Poor sleep -- very, very common. Reduced need for sleep, reduced appetite. -He's having hallucinations. -Yes, there we are, he's having some hallucinations, which is common in very severe mania, the times when he had to be restrained, for example. There was also a lot of violence and things like that. And so, now, they've ticked what the diagnosis is and it comes up as the most probable diagnosis is what we now call bipolar disorder. ♪♪ Not a concept they had. -At the time. -No, not at all. Any doctor reading that now, it would just shout "bipolar" at you, it really would. -I'm convinced. -[ Laughs ] Yes. -But can you tell me what causes it? -I wish I knew. I don't. -Yeah. -Nobody knows. What we do know is there's very compelling evidence that what we call life events, major traumas in your life -- bereavement or being a victim of crime or, you know, divorcing, something like that -- it doesn't cause bipolar disorder, but what it does do, it will then trigger an episode and you'll have a full-blown illness. So, it's sensitive to what's going on in our environment. ♪♪ -If episodes of bipolar disorder can be triggered by traumatic events or extreme stress, what was happening in George's personal life in the run-up to '88? ♪♪ There's something I want to see at the Royal Academy, an art school and gallery founded by George III in London. ♪♪ By 1783, George had 15 children. The older ones, particularly, the Prince of Wales, were causing him all sorts of trouble with their overspending and their womanizing, but he really doted on the two littlest boys. [ Melancholy tune plays ] Tragically, George's toddler, two-year-old Alfred, died suddenly. ♪♪ Then, eight months later, four-year-old Octavius died, too. ♪♪ Infant death was common, so you might think parents were used to dealing with this kind of loss. ♪♪ This is such a poignant image. ♪♪ It's an engraved copy of a painting George had done to commemorate his two lost little boys. This is Prince Alfred, who died first, and he's in heaven already, and he's welcoming in his brother Prince Octavius. Octavius dies, and this angel's here to look after them both. George had the original of this on the wall of his bedchamber, so that, when he woke up in the morning, the first thing he'd see were his lost sons. That, alone, I think, speaks volumes about what this loss meant to him. ♪♪ ♪♪ It seems to me that this could have been a trigger for his breakdown in 1788, but to prove it, I need a window into George's mind. [ Suspenseful music plays ] ♪♪ You might think that's impossible, but I've come to the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew, where Octavius and Alfred once played, to meet a professor who's doing something unique -- he's examining George's hallucinations and delusions. How do you know what the king's delusions were? -Well, we have very few direct records of what the king said, but we do have what the pages, the attendants, who were looking after the king when he was asleep or in the night told the doctors the next morning. From those, you get these often very brief references to things that he is said to have believed or imagined, but which, when you put them all together, is quite a substantial body of material that just lets you see inside the king's mind, really. -And do you think you can see evidence of specific trauma, bad things that happened to him in his life, that you see sort of being processed through these delusions? -Well, there are particular instances relating to his children. He was a very devoted father and, when they were lost, at different stages of his life, they then reappear to him in his delusions, in, really, very moving ways, actually. -What sort of delusions is he having about his lost children? -There's a very particularly moving instant that takes place on Christmas Eve 1788. On this particular night, what the king records is thinking that the pillow of his bed is Octavius, -Oh! -who's come back and... -This is so awfully sad. -...it's all then described here. -It says, "He had the pillow in the bed with him, which he called Prince Octavius, who he said was to be new born this day." The reason this is so upsetting is because you just have the image of him holding the pillow like it was the baby. Oh. -That's the recurring trope, actually, for the king because, when his daughter Amelia dies from TB, after she's dead, he begins to imagine having conversations with her and that she's had holes drilled in her coffin and, in fact, survived burial and has come back to talk to him after that. That's a very strange delusion, which, again, echoes this earlier incident with Octavius. The fact that this comes up in his delusions, not only in this illness, but in his later illness, too, suggests that that's the trigger. -Arthur, do you feel that this research is giving you a really extraordinary insight into the mind of a king? -There's a sense in which one of the things that's happening to him in his illness is he becomes disinhibited and will actually, perhaps, articulate things that he otherwise has been suppressing or repressing in his mind. -And, in a way, it's his illness, it's his so-called madness, that allows us to know him. -Absolutely. We don't get to those bits of his mind otherwise. -Hm. ♪♪ I've been left feeling really sad about what Arthur had to say about George's love for his children and his grief for their loss. It's easy to forget that he wasn't just a king, he was also a human being. ♪♪ Because the children were so young, their deaths weren't marked in the formal way a royal death normally would be, so, George doesn't have these rituals to help him deal with his loss. I think he must have repressed his grief and it burst out during episodes of mania. ♪♪ [ Suspenseful music plays ] It's clear to me there's concrete evidence of personal trauma which could've triggered a bipolar episode... ♪♪ ...but I also want to look at the political pressures on George, too. I know it was a tricky time to be the British king. George was facing problems at home and abroad. ♪♪ "An account of the rise and progress of the late tumults." ♪♪ Dead bodies in the streets of London. This is serious stuff. ♪♪ Newspaper headlines from the 1780s reveal a time of huge turmoil. ♪♪ George decided to grant some new rights to Catholics. It seemed like a generous and liberal thing to do, but it went horribly wrong. There were anti-Catholic riots and sectarian violence on the street. This newspaper article here describes a Roman Catholic chapel being set fire to. What they call the mob are out on the streets. They're waving revolutionary flags, actually. Things are on the brink of enormous trouble. This era was marked by revolution, and it wasn't just Britain on the brink. The French king faced an assassination attempt and the bloody American War of Independence was about to end almost two centuries of British rule. Here's Cornwallis, defeated at Yorktown, doing the walk of shame. They're taking down the British flag and they're putting up the American flag in its place. So, George would've hoped to have added to his empire, but, instead, he must've felt that he had, effectively, lost America. ♪♪ These crises coincided with the start of the mass news era. George had nowhere to hide. He was exposed. ♪♪ And I've found an extraordinary letter which suggests George was afraid he was failing as a king. Now, this is just the most fascinating document from the Royal Archives of 1782. It's a letter that George III has drafted, saying that he's going to hand in his resignation. "I am therefore resolved to resign My Crown." Extraordinary. No king had abdicated for a thousand years. And just think of the huge stink that there was when Edward VIII abdicated in the 20th century, at a point when the monarchy was much less politically significant than it was here in the 18th century. George has clearly agonized over his decision. There's all sorts of crossings out and underlinings in his letter. And there's a real sense of alienation here, and disillusionment. Now, he never actually sent his letter of resignation to parliament, but it shows the mind of a king in turmoil. ♪♪ George is under extreme pressure to make monarchy work in this new era. He must evolve or perish. ♪♪ George styled himself as a new, slightly more accessible, kind of a king. His line was that he was going to listen to people's grievances and respond to them. Now, ordinary working people didn't have the vote, but they could make political points through giving the king petitions. They were able to take their problems straight to the top. ♪♪ Crowds gathered at the gates of the royal palace of St James, waving their petitions, begging the king for help. And, in August 1786, something happened that I think must've increased the pressure on his already vulnerable mind. As it says in the newspaper, "His Majesty was stepping out of his post-chariot at the garden entrance to St James's,' just over there, "when the attack was made upon his life. The woman by whom the desperate attempt was made, had been observed waiting the King's arrival for some time." ♪♪ -The woman advanced from the crowd and presented a paper folded in the form of a petition. The woman aimed a blow with a knife... -...at his majesty's breast with a knife concealed in a piece of paper. The knife cut the king's waistcoat. Accounts -- The knife was instantly wrested from the woman. -And he hastened into the palace. -The woman was immediately taken into custody and, on examination, appears to be insane. ♪♪ I'm fascinated by this assassination attempt, when a mentally ill woman and a soon-to-be mentally ill king came face-to-face. Who was she, and how did George react? ♪♪ -This is a woman called Margaret Nicholson. She's a 36-year-old spinster and needlewoman and she felt that something needed to be done to improve her life. So, she petitions the king, so -- -So, she's writing him letters, saying, "Dear King, I want you to do this for me." -Well, yeah, well, you know, if only it was that clear. She wrote a -- [ Laughs ] -What sort of things? -So, here's one of Margaret's petitions. She thought she was due a property settlement of some sort. She thought she was due a decent marriage, possibly to the king himself, if only he'd rid himself of his ghastly foreign wife. -Do you think that she was suffering from some sort of mental health issue? -Well, that's an interesting question. She petitions the king something like twenty times, just between April and August of 1786, by her own testimony. On the 2nd of August 1786, she's clearly had enough, so she turns up one more time. The king gets down out of his carriage. She's ushered towards the king. I expect they've all seen her before, they know who she is, and she's got her little piece of paper again, but the piece of paper, this time, conceals a dagger. -Yeah. -And then, immediately -- this is the interesting thing, I think -- he immediately says, "The poor woman is mad. Do not hurt her." And we know he said that straightaway because, just about two hours later, one of the young pages who'd been attending the king testifies these were the words the king used. -Do you think that, when he gave this compassionate reaction towards Margaret Nicholson, "Don't hurt her," do you think that he saw a fellow sufferer? -He immediately identifies what's wrong with her, so, whether or not, yeah, it's a little bit close to home for him or he recognizes a fellow sufferer, the incident provoked a huge public conversation, in the newspaper press and elsewhere, about whether or not Margaret Nicholson was mad. Because, if she's going to be put before a law court, it's going to have to be on a charge of high treason. ♪♪ -George's words, "Do not hurt her," became iconic. They were in newspapers, in prints. It was wonderful PR for the king. His compassion towards Margaret brought mental illness into the open. But what happened to her? Was she treated kindly, as he'd asked? ♪♪ There's no evidence of a public trial, but there is a folder in The National Archives with her name on it. Margaret's case went right to the top. It was the Privy Council, the king's advisors, who decided her fate. ♪♪ Oh, yes! ♪♪ Look at all of this! So, it's clear that they've done a pretty thorough job. They've examined Margaret herself. She has -- Oh! She said here that she never meant to kill the king, but just wanted to get his attention. And they've also talked to her brother. He says that she came to London twenty years ago and that she'd worked as a housemaid, but she'd been sacked from that job and she had been ill. He says that she's been "breaking out into fits of laughter in the night." And the brother also says this. It's extraordinary. He says that, "reading Milton's Paradise Lost and such high style Books... had contributed to turn her Brain." That's such an 18th-century thing, isn't it, to imagine that reading fancy books can make a woman mad? So, what are the Privy Council going to do? What she'd done, an assassination attempt, was treason. She could've faced the death penalty. But they didn't go down that route. So, instead, they turned to the Vagrancy Act and they used that to have her shut up in Bethlem, better known as Bedlam. This is Georgian England's most notorious madhouse. They get her assessed by one of the doctors from Bedlam. This is Dr. John Monro and he says that never in his life had he seen a person more disordered. But that's really quite a strong statement, isn't it, from the man who runs England's most notorious madhouse, that he'd never seen a madder person than Margaret? Makes you wonder if he's overstating the case, so that they can all, with good conscience, lock her up. ♪♪ [ Clang, keys jingling ] And she's not the only one. ♪♪ In November 1788, George succumbs to all the political and personal pressure and becomes seriously ill. ♪♪ After weeks of failed treatment, his doctors take an unprecedented step and secure him. Not in Bedlam, of course, but in Kew Palace, just outside London. ♪♪ The king's eldest son senses an opportunity. He tells everyone his father is unfit to rule and positions himself to seize power. ♪♪ Daily bulletins are tied to the gates of Kew Palace, but they are heavily censored and don't explicitly mention madness. Speculation runs rife. ♪♪ So, here we have two infamous so-called mad people, a seamstress and a king, tied together by this assassination attempt. I'm so intrigued! And it was the same with the public back then -- they couldn't get enough of the story. ♪♪ -These are just a small snapshot of the many, many different images that were being produced. A lot of the facts were few and far between and a lot of embellishment was going on. So, here we have Margaret in Bethlem. -Oh, my goodness! Is that her there? -That's supposed to be her -Oh wow. -and this image is kind of extraordinary. It shows this violent, strange, terrifying figure. She's clutching straw. Straw was used as bedding in asylums. -Ah! -She's kind of involved with these two figures, two of the leading revolutionaries of the day. -So, here we've got rational masculinity -Mm! -and here she is looking -- well, this is the archetype of the madwoman, having crazy hair. -Exactly, kind of Medusa-style. -Yeah. Clearly, people are making money out of Margaret Nicholson. Was there a real market for this? -Absolutely. Waxworks were being made. People would pay to see waxworks and her lodgings were described as being besieged. -When the king himself became ill, how was he treated by this sort of media of the 18th century? -I think one of the really striking and surprising things is that there was very little cultural treatment of the king. So, one of the very few images we have of the king when he went mad is this one, Filial Piety, and it shows the king looking, perhaps, ill, but none of the kind of typical iconography about madness is being applied to him. On the left-hand side, we have the Prince of Wales, who's sort of obviously drunk. We've got the kind of political backdrop of the regency crisis in 1788. -I suppose here, what's really going on is that they're using the situation to make the Prince of Wales look bad. -Exactly. The madness of the king is being downplayed. I think it's a bit of a no-go area. ♪♪ -The press show some respect when reporting the king's illness. But for Margaret, not only poor, but also a woman, they show no such restraint. [ Creaking ] She even became a spectacle. The upper classes could go and ogle her in her cell at Bethlem. It all smacks of double standards. I think, if I really want to get a full picture of mental illness at this time, I need to investigate Margaret's experience, too. ♪♪ ♪♪ These two statues are the very last surviving bits of the Bethlem Hospital, where Margaret was incarcerated. It was demolished in 1815. They represent the different types of madness that people believed existed in the 18th century. This one is melancholy madness. He's calm and still. And this one is a raving madness. He's trying to burst out of his chains. ♪♪ These two were over the entrance when Margaret arrived. Not exactly a warm welcome. ♪♪ In the 1780s, doctors still thought they could treat people with mental illness by purging it from the body. I'm hoping that Bethlem's archivist can help me uncover the details of Margaret's treatment. [ Rattling ] -We actually have her admission record here, which would've been created when she first came in to the hospital. We can see Margaret's name. -Margaret Nicholson, there she is. Do you know how they would've diagnosed her, what sort of an illness they thought she had? -The hospital would've been split into male and female wings and it would've been split into melancholics and ravers. -And where do you think she fitted into that? -I mean, I think, generally, she's described as quite a quiet... -She's quiet. -...withdrawn patient, I think, a lot of the time, so I'd be surprised if she was moved apart from the melancholy patients. -These categories are not super subtle, are they? [ Laughs ] -No, they really aren't. -What were the conditions like in the hospital? -They were probably not very good. So, people were bled, people were given medication that would make them vomit or purge themselves in other ways. -Mm. -It was known -- round about this sort of time there's a new strain of thought that's saying this isn't working, but Bethlem is still persisting in this. -So, is there some information about what happened next to Margaret? Does she appear again? -Yes, so we will see her again in the incurable admission register. So, the incurable ward would've been the long-stay section of Bethlem. -You say that, but the name, it's a very depressing thought, isn't it? -It is, yes. You know, these are people who were -A long stay. -probably lifers... -Mm. -...by this point. Note says a motion was made "that Margaret Nicholson be no longer confined in her cell by a chain." -Oh! So, what year is this? -This is 1791, so this is four years. -So, she's been in chains for four years? -She is regularly clapped in irons, yes. -Goodness me. I'm thinking what this means. Does this mean that the hospital committee have decided that she's so peaceful and not hurting herself that they don't need to bother doing that? -Yes, yes, but what is also interesting in this is the implication that she is well enough to be unchained, but she's still in the incurable wing. -And that might be because she's this special patient. What she did received national attention, therefore, the bar for her recovery is higher than it is for anybody else. -It also, perhaps, implies that the hospital has been told not to release her -Not to release her. -in any circumstance. -Oof. -Mm. She has been, if you like, disposed of by the state. ♪♪ ♪♪ -It's pretty clear that, at Bethlem, they were still committed to doing things the old way -- patients in cells, chains. And it's rather devastating to think of Margaret being written off, almost, with that word -- incurable. ♪♪ In 18th century Britain, madhouses, or asylums, were a law unto themselves. Bethlem hadn't updated its treatment plan in 100 years. But there was a new school of thought that mental illness was an illness of the brain, that needed to be treated in its own way. ♪♪ Some of these new ideas were to be found in this book. It's the first proper book about madness as a mental illness. It's called "A Treatise on Madness," by Dr. William Battie. This was really radical stuff and he suggested that it was wrong to chain up mentally ill people. Nor was he in favor of shock treatments, things like making people vomit. Instead, he proposed quiet, and fresh air and exercise, which sounds extraordinarily modern, doesn't it? That's what people are still recommended to do to this day. Battie's book was published in 1758, so that's 30 years before the king got ill, but it was George's illness, and Margaret's, too, that raised the profile of his work. It went mainstream and people started to implement it. ♪♪ So, while Margaret was written off as incurable, did these new ideas reach George? ♪♪ In winter 1788, George is delusional, aggressive, sleepless, and time is running out. ♪♪ A regency bill has been prepared. If the king is not better in three months, his son will take over. ♪♪ In December 1788, the royal family make a bold decision. They summon a man called Francis Willis, who runs a madhouse in rural Lincolnshire, to come here to Kew. ♪♪ Private madhouses begin to spring up from the 1750s onwards, as new treatments are pioneered. Willis is one of a band of so-called mad doctors, or, to you and me, early psychiatrists. Let me introduce you to Dr. Francis Willis. I'm calling him Dr. Willis, but, I do know that his contemporaries might not have agreed with me in doing that because they didn't yet have the idea of a doctor of the mind. Members of the Royal College of Physicians, for example, would've said, "No, he's just the keeper of a madhouse. We don't count him as one of us." So, I think it's quite an exciting decision that the royal family have called him in. It's...a sign of how desperate they were, I think. He's a maverick. ♪♪ This is a make-or-break moment, for him and for his nascent profession. There's no higher-profile patient than this. What on Earth is he going to do? ♪♪ George was treated by Willis here at Kew. The king's tin bath still survives. ♪♪ This source is key to what happened to him. It's a diary by Francis Willis and his son and they start off explaining what the previous doctors had given the king. The answer is really powerful sedatives. Here, he's been prescribed 30 drops of laudanum. Now, that is opium dissolved in alcohol. It's not a sustainable strategy. It's not going to make him better. It might even get him addicted. It's kind of like prescribing the king heroin. ♪♪ Willis decides to put a stop to this and he radically reduces the dosage. ♪♪ He also makes a bold decision -- to treat George just as he would any other patient in his asylum and bend the king to his will. ♪♪ Oh, wow! -I've got a straitjacket for you. -My goodness! What?! [ Laughs ] -It keeps on giving. -What is with these arms? They're so long. How does it work? -Here's the back. -It buttons up the back, so you put your arms in like that and it's done up. Why are the sleeves so immensely long? -So, you put your arms in there and then you hug yourself and then you get tied round the back. -Oh. So, it forces you to go like this, to give yourself a hug? -Yes. Once you've no longer got the use of your hands, your flight-and-fight mode is turned off, so that it could then support you to calm yourself down. -I was expecting something barbaric, something that was to do with restraint. -Compared to the manacles, which was what people were using before, this was really soft -Oh! -and kind. -This is a big step forward. -Certainly, when I first looked at this, I had the same feelings as yourself. It's like really scary, the idea of being, you know, tied up, really, but this is a treatment and most illnesses, you know, most treatments are scary. -Let me show you some of the ways in which Dr. Willis used the straitjacket. Well, he doesn't actually call it a straitjacket. "The strait waistcoat was taken off from his majesty at morning yesterday, but was put on again soon after two o'clock & was not taken off till nine this morning." Goodness me, so he was kept in his strait waistcoat for the whole of this particular night. -Nowadays, we use drugs, and that's a chemical restraint. -Yeah. -Sometimes that's not appropriate, either, because it's just treating the symptom. It's not allowing your brain to rebalance and sort itself out. -That's really interesting, that you're using the word rebalance the brain. That's the language that Francis Willis used in the 18th century. Now, even if Francis Willis had the best intentions in the world, I do feel sorry for the poor king because it says here, "They beat me like a madman." ♪♪ -The king doesn't escape the brutal remedies of purges and ice-cold baths, but there were also new ideas at play. Willis is clearly picking up on the progressive approach of William Battie. While Margaret, in Bethlem, is chained and left to rot, Willis is encouraging George, at Kew, to take the air. [ Birds chirping ] And even though George does try to scale the giant pagoda, a 50-meter structure, Willis is confident his strategy is having some success. ♪♪ If you leave it untreated, an episode of mania can last between days or months and, to this day, doctors don't really know why they come to an end. But, on the 26th of February 1789, a bulletin appeared on the gate of Kew Palace. Three months after he'd arrived, Dr. Willis has able to announce the entire cessation of his majesty's illness. ♪♪ Assuming he had bipolar disorder, it could simply be that this episode had run its course. But it appears that Dr. Willis has cured the king. And not a moment too soon. The government bill that would hand power to his son is only days away. After months of political uncertainty, George is, once again, ready to be king. ♪♪ [ Chorale plays ] ♪♪ On St George's Day, there was a huge celebration of the king's recovery, here at St Paul's Cathedral in Central London. Now, the Archbishop of Canterbury recommended that George himself shouldn't attend. He thought the excitement might bring on a relapse. But George had other ideas. He said, "No, I'm going." "My Lord," he said to the Archbishop of Canterbury, "I have twice read over the evidence of the physicians on my case and, if I can stand that, I can stand anything." [ Suspenseful music plays ] Thousands lined the route to St Paul's and medals were struck to commemorate the occasion. And here is one of them. They're not actually that hard to find because so many of them were made. This one came off eBay. And on one side we've got George's little face. There he is, looking alive and well. And, on the back, the exciting story of what's happened. It says, "Lost to Britannia's hope but to her prayers restor'd." ♪♪ George's illness appears not to have destabilized the nation, after all. If anything, it humanized him in the eyes of his people. The irony is that King George III was virtually the only monarch left standing in Europe by the end of the 18th century. ♪♪ But the story doesn't end there. There's another medal. ♪♪ Dr. Willis had his own medals struck. He paid for these himself. They're a different grade. This is the cheaper, copper, version and this is the deluxe, shiny, tin model. You've got a picture of Dr. Willis on the front and, on the back, it says, "Britons rejoice your king's restored." The message is, "I'm Dr Willis. I restored him." It's the most fantastic bit of self-promotion, a bit like an advert, really, for this man you might almost call a psychiatrist. And I think the significance is that this profession of psychiatry is coming out of the shadows. It's getting respectable. This is its moment of triumph, if you like, captured in tin. ♪♪ George may be restored to health, but Margaret gets no medal and no redemption. ♪♪ It would be 25 years before the British government began to tackle the horrific conditions inside public asylums. ♪♪ During that time, the king had further episodes of illness, both in 1801 and 1804. ♪♪ He convalesced for a time in the home of a friend, an MP, called George Rose. ♪♪ Witnessing the king's illness gave Rose real insight and, in 1815, he led a government investigation at the Bethlem asylum. ♪♪ These are the minutes of this parliamentary committee that's looking into "the Better Regulation of Madhouses in England." They're calling all sorts of witnesses to give evidence and a very dark picture's being painted of existing conditions. This part's really distressing. We've got a witness who's seen unfortunate women locked up in their cells, naked and chained on straw, with just one blanket for a covering. Now, George Rose clearly suspects that there have been male keepers looking after female patients, which is inappropriate. Power could've been abused here. And he's really going after Dr. Monro, who's in charge of the Bethlem Hospital. Dr. Monro says, "In Bethlem, the restraint is by chains. There is no such thing as chains in my private mental hospital." And he's asked about this. "Why? Why the difference in standard?" And Dr. Monro says, "Well, it's because chains are fit only for pauper lunatics." Isn't that shocking? He says, "If a gentleman was put in irons, he would not like it." Too right! I don't think Dr. Monro realized how much he was going to damn himself by this statement. It caused a scandal! People were offended by this idea of a double standard for rich and for poor. The fallout of this was so bad that Dr. Monro had to resign. ♪♪ This committee exposed the sexual abuse and excessive restraint that had been rife for decades. It was a watershed moment. A process of reform had begun. ♪♪ Fearing further censure, Bethlem started keeping individual patient notes. ♪♪ Now, these books are from after 1815, when they had to keep fuller records, so I'm really hoping these might shed some more light on Margaret. ♪♪ Because of the king's illness and the reform that followed, I can now, at least, find her in the records. ♪♪ Oh, look at this! It's progress reports in 1816, 1817, 1819. By this time, she's been in the hospital for nearly 30 years. It says here, "She is now in an advanced stage of her life and is perfectly deaf... She's decent in her appearance and quiet and civil in her demeanor." It sounds to me like she's better. And then the records stop. It's really fantastic to get a glimpse of a real person here. And she doesn't seem like either a criminal or a patient anymore. She's just a quiet old lady. Do you know what? I've got a little tear in my eye. ♪♪ Reform really came too late for Margaret Nicholson. She was incarcerated in Bethlem for 42 years and died on the 14th of May 1828. ♪♪ George III was suffering from chronic mania and dementia when he died, on the 29th of January 1820. ♪♪ This encounter between George and Margaret happened at -- in fact, it fed into -- this key moment of change for the science of psychiatry and for the reform of psychiatric asylums. There's still so much more to learn about the complexities of mental illness, but this was the starting point. -"Lucy Worsley Investigates" is available on am*zon Prime Video. ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪

The Witch Hunts from Lucy Worsley https://www.pbs.org/video/the-witch-hunts-xkubjt/ VIDEO Preview Link https://www.pbs.org/video/imprisonment-agnes-gzj5ww/ TRANSCRIPT to full show [ Bird cawing ] -Scotland, 1591. A woman is about to be executed. Her crime? She is a witch. -Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly. -She's been interrogated and tortured, and now she'll be strangled and burnt at the stake. This woman met her death a century before the notorious witch trials in Salem, Massachusetts. I want to know how her execution sparked terrifying witch hunts across Britain and America, leading to the death of thousands more like her. -The ungodly are not so! ♪♪ In this series, I'm reinvestigating some of the most dramatic and brutal chapters in British history. ♪♪ It wasn't just one generation. It was three generations losing their lives, bam, bam, bam. These stories are epic and legendary, and they all have fascinating mysteries at their heart. It's chilling to think that this could actually be evidence in a murder investigation. I want to look at them from a fresh and modern perspective to see if I can unlock their secrets. ♪♪ It's a horrible psychosexual form of torture, isn't it? -Absolutely. -By uncovering forgotten witnesses, reexamining old evidence, and following new clues, can I get closer to the truth? -It is one of the great British mysteries. -It was one of those moments, I'm afraid, for a historian, that makes the hair stand up on the back of your neck. [ Bird cawing ] ♪♪ [ Thunder rumbling ] ♪♪ -Today when we think about witches, we think about old hags with pointy hats and broomsticks and black cats. But witches have a history that's long, sinister, and very real. 400 years ago, thousands of ordinary women were tortured and executed in witch hunts. I want to know who these women were and why they were killed. ♪♪ This story begins 400 years ago in Scotland, near Edinburgh, in a small seaside town called North Berwick. What happened here would start a craze for witch hunting that would spread across the country and to North America. I'm heading to the scene of the crime, the Old Kirk, or church, of St Andrew. Though it looks a bit like a small hut. ♪♪ Today, this is all that remains of a once-sizable church. And it was here one night in October 1590 that a group of witches supposedly gathered. ♪♪ What a great place for a witches' meeting, right on the edge of the sea with a huge, craggy, devilish looking rock in the background. In 16th century Britain, everyone believed in witchcraft. This was the story told about what supposedly happened here. "On the night of All Hallow --" That means Halloween, the perfect time for some witchy business... ♪♪ [ Women singing indistinctly ] ...there were a great many witches to the number of 200. And it says that they had flagons of wine, they were making merry and drinking, and that they were singing all with one voice. ♪♪ The story goes that the devil was here. [ Distorted singing ] And these witches were concocting dangerous spells. ♪♪ [ Women singing indistinctly ] They took a cat and christened it and afterward bound to each part of that cat the chiefest parts of a dead man. And the said cat was put in the sea. And then there did arise such a tempest in the sea as a greater hath not been seen. [ Thunder crashes ] This storm had been conjured for one purpose -- to kill the king of Scotland. ♪♪ James VI had been returning by ship from Denmark and was lucky to survive. It all sounds absolutely bonkers. [ Laughs ] But it all, uh... It makes a crazy sort of sense. This is exactly the sort of thing that witches are supposed to do, isn't it? They're supposed to play around with corpses and cats. Witches are supposed to be able to control the weather. It's one of their powers. ♪♪ It might sound like a fairy tale, but what happened here set off a devastating chain of events. Dozens were executed for this alleged plot, and it triggered a century of persecution across the British Isles and beyond. Thousands more would be killed for the crime of witchcraft, some of them men, the majority women. ♪♪ [ Bell tolling ] To understand why this story had such impact, I want to see the original text for myself. It's held here at the University of Glasgow archives. It's a pamphlet printed in London called "Newes from Scotland," and it gives a full account of this plot against the king and the trial of those held responsible. Only a very few of these pamphlets survive. ♪♪ This little book is more than 400 years old. It's an account and quite -- in fact, it's quite a sensational, tabloid-y account of the first major witch hunt in Scotland. It was written in 1591, shortly after the events it describes. I-I have picked up many, many old books, and it never gets old. It's a pleasure every single time. You can't open it too wide. Don't want it to snap. Here's a little summary. It's "a true discourse of the apprehension of sundry witches lately taken in Scotland, whereof some --" whew -- "are executed, and some are yet imprisoned." ♪♪ These must be the witches. They're all bustling along in a sort of girl gang. And it's pretty clear that they are witches, because here is the devil. He's in a pulpit. He's making a sermon like a priest would do. But he's the flipped image of a priest. He is, in fact, the devil. And these witches here at the top, they are working magic with their cauldron. They have cooked up a storm that has destroyed His Majesty's ship. You can see it's been wrecked. People are falling into the waves. And these are the witches who disrupted the king's journey back from Denmark. ♪♪ This pamphlet was commissioned by King James himself. It was distributed in England to tell the story of his triumph against the witches' wicked plot. It's clearly designed to be dramatic. Mm, so, this is quite emotive language here. They're not just witches. They are wicked and detestable witches. They had seduced by their sorcery a number of others to be as bad as themselves. So, this is a problem. The number of witches in Scotland is growing. There are more and more of them every day. We should be very afraid. The author tells us that God hath lately overthrown and hindered the intentions and wicked dealings of a great number of ungodly creatures no better than devils. "Newes from Scotland" paints witches as a serious threat to order and stability and the witch hunt as the necessary means by which the godly can prevail. But why was the Scottish king so eager to tell the English about his triumph over evil? ♪♪ Son of the infamous Mary Queen of Scots, he became king at a time of great change in politics and religion. The Reformation was sweeping across Europe, as Protestants rejected the Pope's authority and centuries of Catholicism. Here in Scotland, James was the figurehead for this new Protestant church, but he also had his eye on the English throne. Queen Elizabeth I was getting older. She had no children. James was positioning himself as a strong and godly ruler, as a worthy successor to the crown of England. ♪♪ I wonder if the Scottish King's desire for the English throne played a part in the ramping up of a war against witches. I want to find out more about him. So I'm meeting an expert at Edinburgh's National Portrait Gallery. -James has just turned 24. He's already had two decades of his reign, and a very turbulent reign it has been. Remember, he's still quite a young king, sort of dealing with noble factions and quarrels, and he doesn't have the all-important heir. -So, am I right that in 1590, James has just got married? -Yes, he's just got married to Anna of Denmark. She's just a teenager. She is his new bride. And of course, now James has the hope that they're going to have children, they're going to produce heirs. -But there have been a few problems in getting her from Denmark to Scotland, haven't there? -Anna's meant to be coming to Scotland, but there are these terrible storms, and her ship springs a leak, and the admiral in charge of the fleet says, "No, we have to turn back." And James makes a decision. "I'm going to go to Anna." Originally, he's driven back by storms. He has to go back into one of the five ports and then try again. But eventually, they make it through, but he's had to leave his country. I mean, okay, he has taken a lot of his nobles and gentlemen with him, where he can keep an eye on them, but he has had to leave Scotland. -It's a risk. -Yes. -So these storms, this business of the weather in the North Sea, is psychologically onerous to him. It's more than inconvenient. It's dangerous. He's had to take risks to his personal safety to overcome it. -Yes. And remember, we've only James. There's no heir. If James goes down with the ship. Scotland is plunged into chaos. -Louise, how familiar do you think James was with the idea of witches and witchcraft? -Witchcraft has been around in Scotland from before the Reformation. The important thing is that people believed that witchcraft is real. And it's also about living in a providential world where you believe God is looking over everything. So if the king is godly, then God blesses him. God blesses his rule. God blesses his country and people. Now, if you annoy God by letting sinners like witches go unpunished, well, that's when God might visit your country with famines and plagues and losses in battle. So, you know, to show you're a good, strong king, you must show you're a godly king upholding God's law and especially against the enemies of God, the witches. -I think King James had found a way to show the English he would be a righteous and godly king, by winning a face-off with witches. That pamphlet, "Newes from Scotland," was clearly good spin for James. But who were the real women from North Berwick in rural Scotland who were branded as witches, strangled, and burnt at the stake? ♪♪ I want to find these women, but it won't be easy. They would have been illiterate and left no writing of their own. And many documents from the witch trials have been lost. This book is a history of King James VI. It's contemporary. It was written in his lifetime, and there's a whole section in it about witches. And there should be a reference to the very first woman to be executed in the North Berwick witch hunt. And here, I think -- Yes -- is her name. Agnes Sampson. ♪♪ Agnes Sampson, "grace wyff." That means midwife. ♪♪ Somebody who brings you God's grace when you're giving birth. ♪♪ And it says "alias callit," which means "otherwise called," "the wyse wyff of Keyth." That means a wise woman, a-a folk healer, somebody with slightly mysterious powers. And it looks like she's from Keyth. ♪♪ So how on earth did Agnes Sampson, midwife and folk healer, get caught up in this brutal witch hunt? [ Baby coos ] ♪♪ The answer could lie in the role she played in her community and in the tools of her trade. Hidden away in the storerooms of the National Museum of Scotland is a unique collection of everyday objects with magical powers. ♪♪ -Well, what we have here is a selection of some of our large collection of charms and amulets which are reputed to have superstitious powers. So, these were objects put to protect you, and they are also curative. -So, what sort of a world are we looking into here, then? One where people probably believed in God but also believed in a load of other sorts of supernatural powers? -Yes. We have religious belief, belief in God, that is able to coexist in their mind quite happily with the supernatural, so, a belief in fairies, malevolent elves, evil witches. -What's this neat, little black one that looks like a Christmas pudding tied up with a ribbon? -This is a seed pod... -Oh, is it? -...that's come all the way possibly from the Caribbean. And it's floated on the Gulf Stream. So, local people, ordinary people, would pick them up off the beaches and use these to help them during childbirth. And as a result, they are called Mary's Nut. -Mary's Nut. -Yes, or St. Mary's Nut. So it's really Mother Mary's protection in childbirth. So it's that combination of a religious belief allied to something that is more of a folk belief and a superstitious belief. -And is it the sort of thing that you'd lend to your friend when she was pregnant? -Yeah, I think you could. -And then pass it on? -Yeah. But you'd probably want your own one anyway, 'cause you're probably giving birth quite a lot. -Oh, many times. Yes. A lot of -- A lot of use for the Mary's Nuts. -Yes. Yeah. -This one catches my eye. -Well, this little cross is a wonderful example of something everyday that anyone could have owned. It's made from rowan, and the rowan tree is supposed to be protective against evil spirit. So you might just carry this. You could have it on your person, or you could have it under your pillow. -Mm-hmm. -And you planted rowan trees in your gardens to keep away the evil spirits. -So, how does a folk healer fit into this world of the amulets and the charms? -So, you'll have had these as your everyday item for everyday protection. And you would bring in someone like a healer, a wise woman, when something has gone really badly wrong. She will have had knowledge of herbs and so on like a homeopath today. But they're also presumed to have magical powers. -This sounds like witchcraft. What's the difference between folk healing and witchery? -The witch is living within the community and associated with evil things, evil spirits, nasty things happening -- disease, crops failing. The folk healer is associated with good things. -So, the folk healer is on your side, and the witch is against you. -Yes. Indeed, she's a witch buster, because she's associated with getting rid of those evil spirits. ♪♪ -As a midwife and healer, Agnes would have been important to her community. ♪♪ But she'd have walked a fine line between helping people and being blamed when things went wrong. ♪♪ ♪♪ It makes me wonder what triggered the first accusation against Agnes. The pamphlet "Newes from Scotland" says a servant girl called Geillis Duncane was the first to say that Agnes was a witch. But I can't find any evidence to back that up. What I have uncovered is this document describing a church leaders' meeting. 15th of September, 1589. The minutes at the synod say they've ordered the Presbytery of Haddington -- That's the local church committee in Haddington -- to summon before them Agnes Sampson, suspected of witchcraft. So here it is in black and white. On the 15th of September, 1589, we have the first reference to Agnes Sampson in connection with witchcraft. ♪♪ So Agnes is under suspicion, and church leaders want to question her. And all this happened a year before the North Berwick trial. ♪♪ By this time, the Scottish Church was in the hands of radical Protestant reformers who'd been led by John Knox. Knox had wanted to create a new godly state based on the pure message of the Bible, obedience and discipline, ushering in a new age of religious puritanism in Scotland. [ Bird caws ] ♪♪ This is St Mary's Church in Haddington. North Berwick and Agnes' village both came under its jurisdiction. The Protestant elders of this church were keeping a close watch on suspected witch Agnes. ♪♪ Hello? ♪♪ And this church was also at the forefront of religious change sweeping the country. -Hello. Will you be Stewart? -Hello, I'm Stewart. Yes. -It's really nice to meet you, Stewart. -Nice to meet you. Welcome to St Mary's. -Thank you for having me. -Not at all. -Now, I know -- Every historian knows -- that in the 16th century, the big thing that happens in Scotland is the Reformation, which is led by John Knox. He's -- He's a Haddington boy, isn't he? -Well, John Knox was born about 200 yards from where we're standing on the other side of the river. And he was almost certainly baptized in this church. -Oh, wow. So, this church -- Well, he was baptized here. This is right at the cutting edge of the Reformation, then, this place. And how would you characterize this -- this Scottish Reformation religion that John Knox was keen on? -'Course, it was a much simpler, stricter, and very -- in some ways, very harsh religion. -So, what kind of behavior did the Reformed Scottish Church disapprove of? -What we might describe as frivolous behavior -- singing, dancing, drinking, and of course fornication. You could be called up in front of the congregation if you're misbehaving in some way. -And that's because the devil is just around the corner, and your soul is at risk of eternal damnation if you step out of line. -Yep. -And John Knox didn't approve of women, did he? -Well, he didn't approve of women being in positions of authority. -Mm. So, if the new church did not like to have women in positions of authority, someone like Agnes, who was a wise woman, who had the trust of the community, do you think maybe they felt threatened by that? -That's quite possible, yes. [ Bell tolls ] -I wonder if Agnes was aware that she was being watched by the church as she went about her business as a midwife and a healer. It's starting to look like there's no place in this new Protestant order for women like her. She is a woman in a position of authority. She's got this power of healing. People in the community trust her, need her, look up to her. Do the church authorities feel a bit threatened by that? [ Bell tolls ] Agnes' fate now lay in the hands of these fervent Protestants. And these religious leaders were absorbing new ideas circulating in Europe about the nature of witchcraft and how to deal with it. They were laid out in a book written by two German Catholic theologians in the 15th century. This is a direct translation of a text that's more than 500 years old. It's called "Malleus Maleficarum," "The Hammer of Witches." And it's a sort of a manual of how to spot a witch and what sort of things they're going to get up to. Demonology books like this made it clear the devil was specifically recruiting women to do his evil bidding. "Why is it that more witches are female than men?" I'm quite interested in what they're going to say about that. Well, it's basically because of the wickedness of women, as spoken of in the Bible. "In Ecclesiasticus 25 -- There is no wrath above the wrath of a woman. I had rather dwell with a lion and a dragon than to keep house with a wicked woman." [ Woman moaning, echoing ] "All witchcraft comes from carnal lust, which is in women insatiable." And that's why the devil's able to recruit them more easily. They're so desperate to fill their wombs that they will consort even with devils. You know, if there aren't enough men to go around, devils will do. The witches meet together in conclave on a set day. And the devil appears to them in the assumed body of a man. And he says to them, "Look, if you have sex with me, ladies, I will give you long life." That is the deal. And this witch is showing her allegiance to the devil by kissing his backside. [ Laughs ] Oh, dear. What has surprised me reading through this book -- And I really wasn't aware of this -- was just how much witchcraft and sex seem to be mixed up together. Fear about sexual matters and the lust of women seems to be absolutely fundamental. ♪♪ So, poor Agnes. She's had the bad luck to be born at a really bad time. It's like the end of days. In the 16th century, everybody gets utterly obsessed with the devil. People now genuinely believe that witches are largely female, that they gather in groups, that they have this kinky sexual pact with the devil, and that their number is growing. More and more witches are being recruited. So what are the authorities going to do to deal with these wicked women? ♪♪ For centuries, accusations of witchcraft had largely been settled within the local community. But if these witches were the devil's agents, the authorities had to do something and crack down. ♪♪ Well, this is the Scottish Witchcraft Act. So, this act was drawn up by Scotland's Protestant reformers. John Knox may even have had a hand in it. It is statute and ordained that no manner of person or persons of whatever estate, degree, or condition is to use any manner of witchcraft. And if you do do that, they'll be under pain of death. It actually says under the pain of "deid," but that means death. You will be killed. It has become a capital offense for the first time. So the Act is really clear that the whole weight of the law is going to come down on anybody doing witchcraft. ♪♪ But there's a -- It seems to me there's a huge problem here. It doesn't actually say what witchcraft is. So witchcraft is open to interpretation, and that means the law is open to interpretation, and that seems to me to be very dangerous. What the Witchcraft Act provided was a legal framework for the prosecution of witches. Now if enough evidence could be gathered, a suspected witch could be tried in the courts and sentenced to death. ♪♪ By autumn 1519, the church elders in Haddington had been investigating and building a case against Agnes for more than a year. I'm told that very few witch trial documents still exist, but remarkably, Agnes' have survived. I can't access the originals in the National Records of Scotland, but the history center in Haddington has a copy. Incredibly, they include detailed transcripts of the evidence against Agnes. It says here, "Here follows the articles of her Dittay, whereof she was convicted, by number, 53." Now, a Dittay -- It's from the French, Dittay meaning "said." These are the things that were said against her, and there were 53 charges. That's quite a lot, isn't it? Okay. Here, she's charged with using of witchcraft in healing of John Thomson in Dirletoune, who remained -- Oh, I see what she's done. She's -- She used witchcraft to heal John Thomson. But he remained crippled -- that's crippled -- notwithstanding thereof. I can see that if you'd booked Agnes to heal you, and then it failed, then he'd want his money back, wouldn't he? You might be so cross that you reported her to the authorities. Let's have a look at this one. Item, for coming to Bessie Aitkenhead and using her prayer and devilish charms for the recovering of her health to her. Well, here's someone who's pleased. Bessie -- Bessie Aitkenhead has been cured. So, when I look at the list of people who've been either cured or not cured by Agnes, it's a bit confusing, 'cause you can't see what the problem is. She's sort of going about her business as a healer. But perhaps the problem is that this old, traditional way of doing things, of healing people, has now become suspicious, because people are increasingly worried about witches. There's a lot of talk here about witchcraft and prayers to the devil. I mean, I cannot know whether all of these people who were Agnes' clients, whether they really said these things, or were these important people who were determined to catch a witch, were they taking the evidence and twisting it and putting on this whole witchy layer? I can't rely on this document for hard facts, but it does offer a tantalizing glimpse of Agnes herself. We're told that she's a widow and has children and that she learned her folk healing skills from her father. So I love the way that, hidden within this formal document written by men who had it in for Agnes, we're actually meeting the real person. And then here, now, this is really extraordinary, because this is just what you don't normally get. You do not normally get the recorded words of somebody living in a tiny village in remote Scotland in the 1590s. That's not somebody that we normally hear from in history. But here we do, because recorded here, are the words to Agnes' prayer to her patients for life or death. "All kinds of ills that ever may be, in Christ's name, I conjure thee. I conjure thee both more..." -I conjure thee both more and less with all the virtues of the mass. And right so the nails sore that nailed Jesus and no more. And right so the same blood that reeked o'er the ruthful rood. Forth of the flesh and forth of the bone and in the earth and in the stone, I conjure thee in God's name. -These are supposed to be her very words. It's like she's speaking to us. ♪♪ It gives a wonderful, tingly feeling. This is -- This is -- This is why we do this, to bring people back from the dead. But one thing is clear. Even if some of Agnes' clients were grateful for her powers of healing, and even if she claimed that her prayer was to God, the authorities were intent on painting her as a witch in league with the devil. And there's something else in here that's really intriguing. ♪♪ People are summoning her from far and wide, and it's not just villagers who are after her services. It's -- It's the toffs. Posh people are after her, too. Perhaps her far-reaching reputation as a healer helps explain why, when the king was looking for a scapegoat for the storms that beset his ship, Agnes Sampson was a ready name on people's lips. ♪♪ In the fall of 1590, just weeks after the alleged witches' gathering at North Berwick, Agnes was arrested and imprisoned in Scotland's capital city, Edinburgh. And in early December, she was brought here to be interrogated. This is the Palace of Holyroodhouse. This was the home of King James VI. This part of the palace here has been altered, but this part is the original palace that Agnes would have seen. She would have set eyes on these two rather sinister-looking turrets. So I really am walking in Agnes' footsteps at this moment. [ Door clanks ] ♪♪ ♪♪ This is the actual chamber in which James VI received visitors. His bedchamber is just through there. And it was here in this room, to the best of our knowledge, that Agnes came face to face with the king. ♪♪ What an extraordinary encounter. A woman from a tiny rural village brought before the king. A Protestant monarch determined to prove he had the power to drive out the devil. So, what on earth happened in this room? "Newes from Scotland" offers this account. Agnes Sampson was brought here to Holyroodhouse before the King's Majesty and sundry other of the nobility of Scotland. But it says here she stood stiffly in the denial of all that was laid to her charge. So she stood up to them. This is a fearsome situation to be questioned by the king himself in his royal palace. But she wasn't giving way an inch. ♪♪ Despite this, at some point, Agnes cracked and confessed. ♪♪ It's chilling to realize that all the detail of what happened in North Berwick, as recounted in "Newes from Scotland," actually comes from the confession Agnes made right here in Holyrood Palace. It was Agnes who said 200 witches gathered together and used a dead man and a christened cat to raise the storm that almost killed the king. This is her story. But why would she say all these things? Reading on, I think I can see why. Agnes Sampson has all her hair shaven off in each part of her body and her head "thrawen" with a rope. But during this time, she would not confess anything until the devil's mark was found upon her privities. ♪♪ Now, to my mind, this is -- this is torture of a really horrible, sexual nature. ♪♪ It's a sort of a sexual assault. ♪♪ And then when this -- when this happened, when they did this to her, she immediately confessed whatsoever was demanded of her. And, goodness me, I'd do exactly the same thing. Poor Agnes. ♪♪ It's hard to be sure whether these descriptions of torture are true. Was this the sort of treatment inflicted on women like Agnes? ♪♪ To find out, I'm traveling to the small Scottish town of Forfar. When a witch hunt happened here in the 1660s, more than 50 women were accused from this small town alone. [ Gasps ] It's Judith. -Hello! -I meet you in the flesh at last. -I know. -One local historian has been doing groundbreaking research into the experiences of these so-called witches. She's uncovered shocking new evidence of their interrogation from unlikely historical documents, the town's financial records. -"Accounts of the town officials" sounds a bit dull. [ Chuckles ] -Yes, it does, if you -- if you don't realize what's going on. And what's going on in Forfar at that time is a witch hunt that's been described as being like no other in Scotland. And when you follow the money, you find some really interesting things. Okay, on the first page, the first section, "ye examiner of Girsell Simpson." She was a suspected witch, but she was arrested, and she was put in a tollbooth. It says an item to Andrew Taylor for closing of the high tollbooth yea time that Girsell Simpson was therein and for taking down of them again. -Oh, so when the suspected witch was in the prison, they closed up the windows. -Yep. -And then when she had been executed, they opened up the windows again. -That's right. -And that would be to keep her in the dark? -Well, it's the devil, and you don't want the devil cursing the people in the street when they walk by. -Wow. Oh, look at this! For the making of two pairs of stocks for the witches. -Oh, yes. So, the stocks are really interesting, 'cause stocks sound like they are quite innocent. You know, we have images of people in the stocks outside. -Being hung up like this, and people throw eggs at them. -That's not what's happening here. In Scotland at the time, stocks were used on the accused witches as a form of torture. -It says here that candles are bought for those who did watch Girsell Simpson, who's the suspected witch. What does that mean to watch her, do you think? -Watching usually comes with waking. So watching and waking was a form of torture in itself. It's sleep deprivation. Later on, we'll see that there -- There are other prisoners in. They're male prisoners, and they're murderers, and they're not being watched. There's no -- There's no candles being paid for for them. -Mm. So the suspected witch is treated worse than the murderers. -Yes. -Wow. -Absolutely. These women, they're a danger because they endanger the whole of society. -Yeah. -They put the idea of the godly society at risk. If you go down to the 13th of September... -Yes. -...John Kincaid and David Cowand come to Forfar. So, John Kincaid is the famous witch-pricker. -The witch pricker. -Yeah. -That's a very resonant phrase. What exactly does that mean? -Well, they pay for two -- "twa preens" for him. -Here it is. This is the purchase of two preens for the pricking of Catherine Porter. -Preens are pins. They're made of iron, and they're usually about 3 inches long. Or some people would say -- -3 inches. -Yeah. -Oh, not tiny, little dressmaking pins. Big things. -Big pins. -And what ex-- Why -- Why do they want to stick these pins into the suspected witches? -They're trying to find the devil's mark. -What's that? -It was usually thought to be a blue mark. It could be a mole. It could be an extra nipple. It could be scars. Anything that they thought was unusual on a woman's body that doesn't respond to pain or doesn't bleed. That was evidence, pure and simple, that you had convened with the devil. So what they would do was they would -- they would shave the woman. They would shave all her hair. And they would -- She would be naked. She's in front of a panel of men, and she's having these pins stuck in all over her body. And they would prick people for hours. There's mention in one of the Privy Council documents of a woman dying from witch pricking. -It's a really -- It's a horrible psychosexual form of torture, this, isn't it? -Absolutely. -What really shocks me, Judith, is that the evidence is here, that they've recorded it for us to see. -Indeed. When I read these treasurers' accounts, and I've read them many times, the hairs never cease to stand up on the back of my neck. And I think, how could they have treated people like this? And then you have to remember what they had in their mind. And in their mind, they were absolutely convinced that they were not people. You know, they -- -They were devils. -Yeah. -Inhuman. -They are the devil. -How long have you been trawling through all of these records, Judith? -About 10 years. -Oh, wow. [ Chuckles ] -At least 10 years. -And what -- what motivates you to do this? -Well, um, one, it's just so incredibly interesting. And, two, there's the real sense of injustice. ♪♪ -Judith's fascinating research shows how the authorities devised a system for rooting out witches. Torture was an acceptable means to elicit a confession. And the so-called devil's mark, which wasn't too hard to find, provided undeniable proof. Under this kind of duress, in December 1590, Agnes made her confession. ♪♪ Remarkably, the National Records of Scotland holds an account of what was said during Agnes' actual interrogation. It also offers clues as to why Agnes' case triggered a terrifying craze for witch hunts that tore across Britain and reached as far as Salem, the fledgling Puritan colony of Massachusetts. Is this word for word, then? Was there someone in the room making notes? How -- How was it put together? -This has been written up afterwards. There was probably a scribe in the room at the time jotting down a few things. But this isn't a transcript of her actual words. This is a summary in the third person, you know. You know, "She confessed that, she denied that," and so on. And we see breaks in the document where perhaps she was tortured. It's hard to tell. We do know in general terms that she was tortured. And we can see this text as a kind of negotiation, because Agnes probably didn't know anything about those storms at the time, but they're asking her about it, so she knows she can't just remain silent. She has to tell a story. Otherwise, she'll get tortured more. -Do you think that the interrogators were asking what we might call leading questions to get a particular answer? -Oh, undoubtedly, yes. You know, "Tell us about when you met the devil," and, "How does one worship the devil?" And so, one of the things that witches do is that they kiss the devil's ass. That is -- -Does it say that in her actual confession? -It actually says. Yes. -"Before they departed, they all kissed his ass." That almost certainly comes from a leading question from somebody who has come across the European learned idea of how witches worship the devil, and Agnes has been made to say it. If people torture you enough, you do get so confused that you lose confidence in your own memory and you start thinking, "The interrogators are right, and perhaps I'm a witch after all." -That's awful. They're breaking her body, but they're also trying to break her mind at the same time. -Yeah, I'm afraid so, yeah. -Really, it seems to me that they're fitting her up. -You certainly could say that. I mean, they're doing it unwittingly. They're terrifyingly sincere, these guys. You know, they think they're getting the truth. They are trying to save themselves and everybody from the terrifying power of the devil. And, you know, it certainly by this time has become a conspiracy. They -- They think it isn't just one witch. You know, it's a group who has done this. And this is what the elite understand that witches will do. They will gather in groups. So they're asking Agnes, you know, "Who else was there?" You know, whether these were names that she gave or names that were fed to her and then she repeated, you can't always tell. You ask for names of accomplices, and you get a sort of snowball effect. And once you've got one witch, you can then go to another and another and another. And, you know, the snowball can go on getting larger until everyone's sick of it. -How any people eventually get pulled into the whole thing? -How many people ultimately is one of the very difficult questions to answer. Almost certainly dozens, probably hundreds, but, you know, many of the records have disappeared. It's very hard to put numbers on it for that reason. -Julian, why is the North Berwick Witch Hunt in particular so important? -There have been earlier trials with individual witches, but they never get into large numbers. They don't manage to interrogate them properly, and it all fizzles out. This is the first big, successful one where we see the witch hunters really working out how to do it. So this provides a sort of blueprint for how to have what you might call a successful witchcraft panic that actually leads to large numbers of executions. And versions of that then get repeated time and again over the next 100 years or so in Scotland. ♪♪ -What's so horrifying is that, clearly, if you torture someone, they'll say anything to make it stop. It's this that made Agnes into a witch and, in a final tragic irony, offer up the names of 59 other people, too, who'd go on to face the same fate. But here's the problem. She's now "officially confessed" to causing storms and to conspiring to kill the king. ♪♪ Six weeks after her confession, Agnes was put on trial in Edinburgh. The building Agnes' trial took place in stood right here. It was in the shadow of the great cathedral. She would have been the only woman in a courtroom full of men. The trial took one day, and the verdict was guilty. ♪♪ The following day, the 28th of January, 1591, Agnes was brought here to Castle Hill. ♪♪ She was to be strangled and burnt at the stake, a sentence reserved only for the most dangerous of heretics. I can't begin to imagine how petrified she must have felt as she was being brought here, knowing what was going to happen. [ Bird caws ] ♪♪ ♪♪ -Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful. But his delight is in the law of the Lord. On his law doth he meditate day and night. -In this moment, religious zeal, fear of the devil, and an ambitious king had collided to create a system of persecution from which there was no escape. And Agnes Sampson paid the ultimate price. ♪♪ [ Bird cawing ] ♪♪ This event, it makes me angry. It seems like a terrible, tragic miscarriage of justice. This is a woman who tried to help people but who ended up being punished for it. [ Bird cawing ] ♪♪ King James got what he wanted and became king of England. Agnes' execution set a blueprint for a century of witch hunts across Britain and America, leading to the trial in 1692 of 200 suspected witches at Salem and the hanging of 19 people. But it was Scotland that would have one of the highest rates of witch killing anywhere. In total, 2,500 people would be executed, the vast majority women. And imagine what it was like for other women in this society, the fear they must have felt that they could be next. The only national monument in Scotland to the thousands killed is this small drinking fountain known as the Witches' Well. But a campaign is now under way for a larger-scale memorial and an official pardon. It's hard to know what to do with these dark chapters from our past. Seems to me there's a double injustice for the women caught up in the witch hunts. They were wrongly convicted, but on top of that, their stories have been forgotten. They've been buried under a pile of stereotypes. Now is the time to restore the voices of women like Agnes Sampson and to make sure they're heard. -"Lucy Worsley Investigates" is available on am*zon Prime Video. ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪

BREAKING the DEADLOCK: A Power Play https://www.pbs.org/video/breaking-the-deadlock-a-power-play-14yofj/ VIDEO TRANSCRIPT If you don't rein in executive power when it's your guy in office, then we're just on this never-ending cycle. Right now, we have a system that's electing performance artists in the highest levels of government. TIM RYAN: We need leaders with guts. "Can" does not mean "should." I've been in the Oval Office before with a resignation letter in my pocket. It's not easy. Don't you have a responsibility to hold up your institution? Just do proximate justice. Just try to get in the ballpark. The oath that I took put my allegiance to the Constitution of the United States, not to any one particular elected president. I am salivating at the subpoena power. (laughter) Consider your political position before you step out here and cause a problem for yourself or the president. ALLYSON K. DUNCAN: Criticism is legitimate. Threats are not. I've had death threats. Power is so intoxicating. JON TESTER: You've got to start talking to one another and you've got to develop trust. And you use the Constitution as the foundation for moving forward. ♪ ♪ ANNOUNCER: This program is made possible in part by viewers like you. Thank you. Location furnished by The New York Historical. ANNOUNCER: Introducing "Breaking the Deadlock" is Katie Couric. In September 1787, at the end of the Constitutional Convention, Benjamin Franklin was confronted with a question. "Well, Dr. Franklin," he was asked, "do we have a monarchy or a republic?" Franklin responded, "We have a republic-- if we can keep it." Franklin and the other founders understood that this experiment in democracy wouldn't be easy. Their instruction manual for us-- that's the U.S. Constitution-- laid out the duties and powers of each branch of government. But they understood that whether or not it would work would depend on our ability to find and respect common civic norms and values. So, where are we today? What do we agree on? And what values can we share? In this program, we challenge a group of panelists to wrestle with the same basic questions about power-- power to determine how we live, work, and think, and whether the people would rule or those in power would rule us. Now we go to Professor Aaron Tang and our hypothetical scenario: A Power Play. AARON TANG: Welcome. This is a story about power. We begin in the state of Middlevania, during the first-term presidency of a person that many of you voted for. Paul Powerton. Now Powerton is getting to work, and he's wielding presidential power in some bold ways to do it. It's gonna lead to some hard questions, starting with one for you, Jon Tester. For generations, your family has owned a farm here in Middlevania. But now that farm is about to go under, all because President Powerton canceled a major federal grant program, and it's left you, Jon Tester, and thousands of other small business owners deep in the hole. How does it feel knowing that you might lose the family farm? Well, it feels pretty bad. My grandfather came out to the farm and homesteaded that place, uh, when there was nothing but grass there. It's part of my person. It's part of what I've done my entire life. Uh, and, uh, to lose that, is losing a part of yourself. And if the farm goes under, are you the only one, you and your wife, who'll be affected? TESTER: Yeah, probably not. TANG: Your community? The fact is that rural America will be affected. If I'm, if I'm going under, it's probably a lot of others going under, too. And then the community gets smaller, Main Street gets smaller, the schools get smaller, and rural America continues to dry up. So it's bad all the way around. TANG: Option number one, you could take out a second mortgage on your home, go further into debt and maybe things will get better. If they do, you might save the farm. But if they don't, you'd lose it all-- the farm, your house, your savings. Option number two, you could sell the farm. I think I would try to keep the farm under all, all options. If you sell the farm, I mean, you've literally let down generations of your family, uh, and you failed them. And you failed your kids and your grandkids, too. TANG: Hard decisions like this are happening at kitchen tables around the country. But Jon, like generations of Testers before you, you steel yourself, and you forge ahead, because today is going to be a special day. It's your favorite day of the year, the annual family barbecue. Dave Brat. Dave, you are a retired United States congressman. You're also Jon's closest cousin. Practically like brothers. Here's what's going through your mind as you head over to the farm. You've got mixed feelings. You know this could be the last barbecue at the farm. And you know it's all because President Powerton canceled that major grant program. And by the way, the name of the grant-making agency that President Powerton has canceled is the Green Business Bureau, GBB. It provides grants for clean energy, environmental projects for small businesses. For Jon's farm, it was solar panels. So, here's the question. When you see Cousin Jon, are you gonna tell him what you believe, which is that the president was right to cancel the Green Business Bureau even if it destroys the farm? BRAT: I'm very sorry to hear about the, the grant and the impact that's gonna have on your farm. But we have $37 trillion in debt. We've fired five million manufacturing folks. So we feel bad for a lot of people in the country right now. And, uh, how do you look at this? I thought that grant would do, uh, some things to help do my part in, in the climate change fight. The bottom line is, though, is that, uh, in the end, uh, we lose the farm. And that... I don't think that's a good thing for me, uh, my family or the community. And I don't think it's a good thing for society either. You're talking in the front yard when you hear another truck pull up, and you turn and you look and you both smile because it's your favorite niece, Sarah Isgur. Your uncles call you over. "Sarah, Sarah, we're having a debate." You, you know about the farm. You know it might be lost. What would you say to your Uncle Jon? I'd say, I think you're making all the right decisions. You know, you took the grants because you thought it would provide a little extra income even though you kinda knew you didn't want to. It didn't pan out. I think the delay would've been nice. It's not what happened. Uh... I certainly would want to look at some legal options for how that grant got canceled. I'm curious about President Powerton's powers to unilaterally cancel that. But, uh, but I support the second mortgage. Don't give up the farm yet. TANG: All right. It's a good niece. TANG: It's a good niece. It's a good niece. As you're talking in the front lawn, a family member calls out from inside the house. "Hey! It's a breaking news story." You look up at the TV and there's a special press event about to start at the White House. So let's go to Washington, DC, now where one of you is in charge. Scott Jennings, you are President Powerton's press secretary. And he's put you in charge today with a simple goal-- "Communicate to the American people how great it is "that I am shutting down the Green Business Bureau. "Billions in dollars in grants for solar panels and windmills. "Because of me, this executive order I've issued, we're saving all of that money for the American people." So, are you excited to communicate that message today? Absolutely. Because it's what President Powerton ran on and was elected to do. And the truth is, what we've uncovered in our investigation since we've taken office, is that billions upon billions of dollars that we don't really have, that we borrow from China, have been spent on political cronies and technologies and unproven ideas. And so what we're doing is we're canceling these grants. And it's unfortunate that there are going to be some people who are going to feel some pain. TANG: You have wisely brought three prominent leaders from your party to join you today to help you spread this message to the American people. Should we meet them? - Absolutely. TANG: All right. Chris Christie. You are a United States Senator from Middlevania. You are a maverick, not afraid to tell it as it is. (chuckles) Marc Short. You are a representative in the United States House of Representatives. In fact, the Speaker of the House. You have a reputation in Powerton's party for getting things done. Roger Severino, you're at the press event, too. You are a close advisor to the president and the former head of a think tank that is very popular with the president's base. Congress, in the past, has debated bills, considered bills to eliminate the Green Business Bureau, to defund the Green Business Bureau, but Congress didn't have the votes. So now President Powerton is doing, through an executive order, what Congress couldn't do. So you're each gonna have an opportunity to get on national TV and thank President Powerton for standing up in Congress's place. Senator Christie, any qualms about standing up on that stage and thanking the President? Well, I'm a little concerned about whether the president has the authority to do that, take away, um, monies that were already appropriated by the House and the Senate. Probably are going to want to talk to the president about whether or not there might be another way to get done what he wants to get done. So, um, as most of my colleagues in the Senate often do, I'll wait and see. Okay. (laughter) JENNINGS: Senator, consider your political position and consider what the American people asked us to do last November, uh, before you step out here and cause a problem for yourself or the president. Don't be on the wrong side of history. Save the republic's fiscal situation. CHRISTIE: Well, while I often take advice on history from press secretaries, um... (laughter) ...I, I, I would, I would, with, with all due respect to, to Mr. Jennings, say that, you know, the oath that I took as a United States senator um, put my allegiance to the Constitution of the United States, not to any one particular man or woman who happens to be elected president or at any other position. And, um, if they're uncomfortable with me saying that this is something that I'm gonna have to really think about, then they could just take me out of the press conference, and I'll hold my own press availability, you know, in front of the West Wing. - Well... - Wow. (laughter) Do you mind, do you mind if I call the Secret Service and have his, uh... (laughter) - Credentials. JENNINGS: ...credentials revoked for the day, or...? TANG: Senator Christie, Mr. Jennings' history lesson wasn't persuasive. His political appeal... CHRISTIE: It could be persuasive. No, no, I... as with many of my colleagues, I just haven't made up my mind yet. TANG: Yeah. And I don't think that I should go out there and just read a position of talking points that was written by the White House. I was elected by the people of Middlevania, and I took an oath to the Constitution. And those two things are my most important constituencies. TANG: Will you be willing at least to stand at the press conference but not speak? No. So you're gonna leave? CHRISTIE: Well, if that's the choice I'm given. I'd like to go and say, "I'm willing to work with the White House "along with my colleagues in the Senate to try to get to a legal and appropriate resolution." Are you okay with him saying that? Well, I'm, I'm okay with him saying that he supports the president's mission. I am not okay if he wants to stand at our press event and call into question the president's motivations or, uh, authority to do it, because we obviously have a different view on that. Don't want to have a public debate at our press event over method, if that's something that we can work out in private later. CHRISTIE: Well, I mean that's okay. I got invited to the press event; I didn't ask to be there; if they're now rescinding the invitation, based on the fact that I can't speak my mind, that's their, that's their right-- it's their White House. You could be sure, though, that I'll have a press event someplace else. So... SEVERINO: If I could jump in. Senator, the problem is that Congress has not cut this program, which requires a president to step in. When there's a vacuum of leadership, the president has the authority to say we're not gonna be spending the money on the Green Business Bureau. And I know there's people that are hurt by this, but there's another side to this equation, the American taxpayer. And the authority of the president to say, "Look, "this is what is best for the American people. "The president ran on this. "We're gonna cut the waste. "We're going to cut the cronyism "with this Green Business Bureau. "And Congress was unwilling to act. So that's why we're in the situation we're in." Those are really all good think tank points. But they, they don't, they don't take into consideration the Constitution, which they may have misplaced over there at the foundation. Um, the fact is that Congress has the power of the purse. Um, the president is not permitted to just unilaterally take away spending that has been appropriated in a budget that was signed by a president. But the foundation did not misplace the Constitution. CHRISTIE: Maybe just didn't... Maybe just didn't read it, I don't know. Well, let's see. TANG: All right. Speaker Short. Are you a thumbs up to speak at the event? While I would encourage the executive branch for what they're doing, would want to stand behind it... - Uh-oh. - Senator Christie, I think, is, is correct that the power of the purse belongs with Congress. And if the courts decide that the executive branch can unilaterally eliminate these programs, then the next time you elect a left-wing president, he can unilaterally restore these programs. TANG: Wow. Scott, some tough calls. So I think, I think I'm okay with the speaker because he obviously shares the president's vision about what the outcome needs to be. And we actually do agree, uh, that we would like to see some permanency in the restoration of fiscal sanity to the national budget. TANG: Okay. Folks, the press starts to enter the room, and one of our members of the press is Lesley Stahl. You are the senior White House correspondent for the Global News Network, GNN. As you are walking in, you get a phone call. You look down at your phone, and it's from corporate headquarters... Ooh... TANG: ...parent company of GNN. And somebody at the parent company says, "Lesley, you know we are on thin ice "with the Powerton administration. "This might be our last press conference "if we don't get this one right. "So, please, if you get a chance to ask a question, "make it a softball, "something that will make President Powerton look good "or at least okay. Will you please do that?" I, I hear what you're saying, but I have to do my job. This is what I was hired to do... TANG: Fierce. - ...ask tough questions. That's my role in society. TANG: So it's not a hard call for you, what you say. But I have to ask you this, Lesley, if this is, in fact, your last press conference in that seat, who do you think the administration will put in the seat at the next press conference? Is it a media outlet that will scrutinize the administration the same way that you and that GNN would? No. But to be honest, I don't think you have to be sitting at the White House to cover the president. And I think you're freer to cover the president in the way I think the press should handle these tough issues... TANG: Okay. STAHL: ...from outside because you can become a captive when you're inside the gate. TANG: Okay. Mr. Jennings, do you want to kick off the event? - Absolutely. TANG: Who are you gonna call? Is your hand up, Lesley? STAHL: Oh, yeah. TANG: Who are you gonna call? Is there only one journalist...? (laughter) Yes, I'm willing to call on Lesley Stahl. TANG: Lesley. STAHL: My question is about the farmers. This is a huge, important, uh, block within your constituency, um, and I know that they are not at all pleased. So please address the problems that the farms are having. JENNINGS: President Powerton loves farmers. We know that. And ultimately what we think we're gonna be able to do is give them better economic opportunities to make a living without having to have artificial income supports from the federal government. STAHL: But why aren't you leaving this up to Congress? I mean, to the speaker, this whole structure that the founders organized is crumbling. Don't you have a responsibility to hold up, as Nancy Pelosi used to say all the time, to hold up the power of your institution? Lesley, appreciate the question. Uh, Speaker Pelosi's not the model that I'm looking to follow, but, um, nonetheless, I think that it is our job in the legislative branch to, uh, fight for the power of purse. And we're the ones that allocate the resources. And it's also our jobs to pass legislation that cuts these programs. Congress has an essential role. It's the role of the purse. SEVERINO: But Congress has refused to act. The, the budget is out of control. The American people spoke loudly. And may I add, the only person who has the weight of the entirety of the American people behind him is the president. Everybody else gets elected by constituents or a state. Only the president speaks for the entirety of the American people. And the American people have said, "Enough is enough. We have to cut the spending and give it back to the Americans." TANG: Let's get some quotes from the opposition party, who hasn't had a chance to chime in yet. We have Senator Tim Ryan, United States Senator, in fact the Senate minority leader. And we have Middlevania's very own attorney general, elected attorney general, Dan Goldman. Who are you gonna call first? I c... I would call the senator first. RYAN: Good to be a senator, I guess. (laughter) STAHL: Um, I assume you saw the press conference from the White House. Um, what do you think about the, the legal issue, and what do you think about the power of Congress? I would like to challenge the Speaker of the House, the president of the Senate, to stand up for the Constitution. The founders, who were breaking free from a king, wanted the people to have the power and the authority. To acquiesce to the president, I think is, is tragic, uh, and completely undermining our democracy. TANG: Okay. Lesley, do you have a question for Attorney General Goldman? STAHL: Given the legal issues involved here, and the fact that you are the attorney general of the farm state, which will be hurt dramatically, is there anything you can do um, to get that money back for your farmers? Yes. I'll immediately be filing a lawsuit, uh, for a violation of the Impoundment Control Act. It does not allow for a president to unilaterally, uh, cancel appropriated funds. It is, uh, the law of the land. And we will protect our farmers at any cost. We have heard a very forceful case for the president's power to save this money for the American people. And we've also heard some competing arguments. Let's return to Middlevania, to the Tester family farm. Farmer Jon, I heard you have that big audience on the YouTube with the tractor repair videos, you know the ones? 300,000 subscribers, right? Will you make a video and tell your people what's really happening to us with this GBB thing? What I would say is, is, uh, I will, but there's got to be more than just me. TANG: Okay. - There's got to be more people so that it, so that it looks as broad-base of a problem as what I and you think it is. TANG: Are there any risks? Sarah, will you tell your uncle is there anything he should worry about before he posts this video on his tractor channel? Sure. I mean, anytime you're calling attention to yourself in the political arena, uh, there's huge risks within your community, within your church. You could get threats. You could have people, um, coming to protest your farm or vandalize your farm. And that can be really dangerous. TESTER: I'm willing to take the risk. But there needs to be more than just me. TANG: Okay. You get a phone call from Middlevania's attorney general, Dan Goldman. He is gonna file a lawsuit for the farmers of Middlevania, and he wants to know if you will join him. Absolutely. TANG: Attorney General Goldman, you have sued, asking a court for an order that the president cannot unilaterally shut down the Green Business Bureau and defund it without Congress. Yes. Uh, Article One makes it very clear that Congress has the power of the purse. The president can come back to Congress with any recommendation to cut the GBB, but the president cannot do it unilaterally. TANG: Okay, so you filed this lawsuit. You're asking for a court order that the Green Business Bureau be reopened. Who's the defendant in that lawsuit? It's you, Roger Severino. The president was so pleased with your performance at the press event that he fired the old GBB director, and he put you in charge. You're the new acting director. And as he gave you that job, he winked at you. And he said, "Roger, you know the assignment. "We've got to shut this thing down for the American people. "And after you do that, I've got your back. Any job you want in my administration, it's yours." But unfortunately for you, the federal judge in the district where Attorney General Goldman chose to file this lawsuit has issued an order requiring Director Severino to reopen the Green Business Bureau offices nationwide. Now, Roger, it's a moment of truth. You have a mandate from your president. You have a core value about returning money to the American people. But you have a federal court order telling you you can't do it. What are you gonna do? SEVERINO: Well, you can't have single judges dictating what a federal agency can or cannot do within the scope of the authority of the president. TANG: You need to make a decision. Are you going to comply with the district court's order and reopen the Green Business Bureau? Well, if this single district judge wants to run my department, we'll see how, how well that goes. TANG: What does that mean, Director Severino? Are you going to say, "No, I'm not complying with this order"? Is that what you're saying? Are you gonna... SEVERINO: No, no. We're, we're gonna see how much stomach this judge has for this sort of fight. Because I think the Supreme Court will back us all the way. And if this judge wants to run my department, have at it, good luck with that. TANG: Okay, folks. A week goes by after the federal judge has issued her order. Two weeks. Folks like Jon are still not getting their grant checks. And the American people don't know what to make of it. They're looking around for somebody in the room to make a decision as to what is gonna happen when we've got a dispute over power between a federal judge and the president's administration. Allyson K. Duncan, You are the chief justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. What's going through your mind? Are you worried to be watching a district judge battling with the president's administration, arguing about who's gonna follow the law, what the law is, like this? Is that concerning for you? - I worry about everything that affects the integrity of the court and the way in which it is regarded. The federal judiciary, the judiciary, is the weakest branch of government. It lacks the power of the purse, which Congress has, and the power of the sword, which the president has. TANG: Are you worried that Director Severino hasn't fully complied with this order right away? Does that worry you? It certainly worries me. If the money leaves the gate, we're not getting it back. That's the fact. The president was elected to end the wasteful spending. If we reopen it, that money's gone forever. We're not getting it back. And that's hurting the American taxpayer. TANG: Attorney General Goldman, should those checks be going out the door while the full case makes its way up? Absolutely. And while I appreciate that the president thinks that every single thing he does is valid because he won an election, unfortunately, every president wins an election. So that's not actually a grounds to stop the payment. TANG: So, Chief Justice Duncan, there is a person on this panel, in fact, who you know very well. They're a former law clerk of yours, smartest law clerk you've ever had. You trust her judgment implicitly. It's Sarah Isgur. Would you give Sarah a call and ask her to help think through this case with you, how you might approach it? Absolutely not. (laughter) She's not working for me now. She is, she is not-- we are not in confidential relationship with one another. She can clerk for me now. You can come back and clerk for me now. TANG: Would you clerk for her now, or do you want to use a different... I've already clerked for her, yes? TANG: You've already clerked for her once. Yeah. - Yeah, I'm not going back. TANG: You're not going back. - (laughter) TANG: What a lonely job, Chief Justice Duncan. Fortunately, Sarah, you have a platform of your own. You are, in fact, a prominent social commentator. You've got a podcast. And Chief Justice Duncan is a big fan of the podcast. So you can say what you think about this case and maybe she'll hear it. Who should win? Should attorney general win, and these checks go out the door, or should Director Severino? ISGUR: Yeah, I don't think this is a close call. For many of the arguments that the attorney general has made, this is simply not within the powers of the president. All the more so because Congress debated this, had bills in front of it, and rejected them. They didn't have the votes. The process is supposed to be exactly that. And if you don't have the popular political will to pass it through Congress, which is meant to be hard and annoying and long and compromising, then you don't get to do it. And just because you were elected president of the nation, I don't give two anythings about who elected you or by how much. (laughter) So Chief Justice Duncan... - Yes. TANG: ...we've heard the arguments. And you do have to cast a vote in this very hard case. DUNCAN: Okay. - What's it going to be? I, I vote that the president does not have the authority to cancel. TANG: The Supreme Court has spoken. Let's call it a five-four vote. Director Severino, what are you gonna do? You have to comply with that order. As erroneous as it may be. (chuckling) We get that half the time. Uh, it was close, unexpected, five-four. But it's one of those things where, if the court has spoken in this sense... ...we'd have to comply with it. Now, doesn't mean it's the end of the fight. We will show how extraordinarily harmful this will be to the American people. I want to come to Senator Christie for a comment. You maybe called it. You could have an "I told you so" moment. Do you go to the press and comment on this order? No. I, I go to the president. And I'm part of his party. Um, I have the president's cell phone number, and I call him. Uh, I'd go around Jennings and call him. I'd say to him, "You know, Mr. President, "I'd like to cut Tester's funding, too. "But I, I want to cut it in a way that makes sense..." TANG: Okay. ...and that doesn't get overturned by the court." I wouldn't go to the press. The press all knows I was right already. So there's no reason for me to go back and reiterate it. TANG: All right. Lesley Stahl. The American people are very confused. There's been a lot of orders, questionable compliance. The people are looking to you for clarity. What's your headline? How are you covering this? STAHL: Well, the first thing I would do is that, uh, I would call Chris Christie and encourage him to leak to me every little thing that's going on. TANG: Senator Christie would never leak anything to you. You don't know him very well. (laughter) Do you see what I'm dealing with every day? I guess the headline is that, uh, "The President Loses." "President Loses." Scott Jennings. Let me tell you something, the president didn't lose. The American people lost. But that's okay, because we think we have enough allies in Congress to ultimately get what we want, even if it's on delay. TANG: Okay. Folks, we've had a big battle. Congress passed the law appropriating money for the Green Business Bureau. The president tried to cancel it. And the Supreme Court has ruled for Congress. President Powerton, as you might expect, is not happy. His supporters are not happy. They're criticizing federal judges. Criticism is part of our tradition. That's what democracy is. Okay, so you're comfortable with criticizing federal courts. Senator Ryan, is it appropriate to criticize federal judges? RYAN: Absolutely. Absolutely. Have you criticized federal courts from time to time? RYAN: From time to time. TANG: Sounds like folks are very comfortable with criticism of judges. It's American. Right to free speech. DUNCAN: Criticism is legitimate. Threats are not. So will you make a public statement? I will, because I believe that this is important. I've had death threats. I know what it's like to have my name and face appear on a program with a death threat from someone who didn't even understand the reading. Thank you, Chief Justice. Folks, let's go back to the White House. The president can't believe that the Supreme Court has ruled against him. But he's got an idea. He's got an idea for how he's going to fight back. And so he calls you into his office, Alberto Gonzales. You are now the United States Attorney General. President Powerton calls you in and says, "Mr. Attorney General, priority number one, investigate Dan Goldman." You'll do that, right? Investigate Middlevania's attorney general, Dan Goldman. What do you say to him? "Obviously, this is a great concern to you, "Mr. President, and, and we'll look at it. "But I'm going to only move forward in an investigation "and prosecution if, in the judgment of my team, we believe that something illegal has, has occurred here." The president says, "Some of my loyal followers "have been taking pictures, photographs, "of Mr. Goldman's home. And it looks like he's gotten some fancy upgrades lately." You know, of course, that Mr. Goldman is now running for the United States Senate in Middlevania. There's an open seat, it's not Senator Christie's seat. You're good. - Thank you. (laughter) Too bad. TANG: But the other seat is open, and if he is using campaign funds to upgrade his house, that would be illegal. So you'll investigate him now, won't you? We might-- we may look at that. Yes, we may look at that, but without, without it becoming public. The president is looking at you and says, "I'll tell you what, Mr. Attorney General, "I want to make a statement to the press that the attorney general, Mr. Goldman, is under investigation." I would urge you, Mr. President, not to make that statement. We don't talk about pending investigations publicly. TANG: What is driving you to resist the president's request? It's not the law. I don't hear you saying it would be illegal or unlawful... Because we keep politics... if this is driven by politics, we absolutely are not going to engage in any kind of investigation, prosecution of our political enemies. We don't do that. TANG: Would you call it... Would you call it a norm? What? That we... TANG: That we don't investigate our political enemies. Ab... absolutely. TANG: You can tell president's not very happy with your answer. He wanted you to be on his side. GONZALES: I've been there. I've been there. TANG: Okay. Decision time. The president says, "I'm going to issue this press statement. "I've changed my mind: it's not seven days, it's 24 hours. "And I need to know if you will sign it, "as my attorney general, that we are investigating "Dan Goldman for campaign finance violations. Can I put your name on it?" First of all, I would try to talk him out of this. You've tried. He's very stubborn. (chuckling) GONZALES: Then I would tell the president, "Mr. President... "I can't sign this statement. "And if that means that you would like me to resign, then I will... then I will resign." I, I've been in the Oval Office before with a resignation letter in my pocket. It's not easy. TANG: It's not easy. But you have to do what you believe is right in the interest of justice. Okay. I'm sorry to tell you, you are no longer the United States Attorney General. (laughter) Mr. Severino. SEVERINO: The resignation is the proper course if you cannot execute it. But the president is going to find somebody that will eventually follow his orders. He wants to know if it'll be you. He wants to know if you will investigate a person-- there is plausible evidence. We've got the photographs. You were good on the Green Business Bureau. Would you? Yeah, if there's enough there there, then I would investigate. TANG: You would investigate. There would have to be sufficient suspicion. TANG: Well, that's what we're finding out, to find... SEVERINO: Right. Look, we're not like the communists-- "Show me the man, I'll show you the crime." Right, we don't do that in the United States. But if there is enough there, there... TANG: Yeah. - Then I would be able to investigate. TANG: Okay. It all depends on the facts. - Yes. SEVERINO: But the president does get to say, "We ought to look into this area." - Okay. - Look, if the president says we're going to take down the mob in New York... - Yes. - ...you go to New York and you shake down mobsters, right? So, the president can order the attorney general... - Congratulations, you are now the Attorney General of the United States. (laughter) CHRISTIE: Not so fast, because I think Ryan and I have something to say about that. And if Gonzales resigned because he felt he was asked to do something by the president of the United States that was unethical, you can imagine that would be questions one through 50 for Severino at his confirmation hearing. TANG: Okay. - So, not so fast. TANG: Not so fast. - Not so fast on the attorney general... TANG: Acting Attorney General of the United States, Roger Severino. And the president says... "Priority number two, investigate that farmer guy who's on TV criticizing me." Will you do that? There would have to be some basis. TANG: Oh, he says... SEVERINO: ...to suspect A crime was done, a federal crime. TANG: Totally. He's looking on his desk, he's like... "He's got that tractor side hustle. "You know people like this, they don't report their income, taking deductions." IRS, everybody's committed a little bit of tax fraud. (chuckling) TANG: Will you investigate Farmer Jon? For tax fraud? That would be a tough one. TANG: That would be a tough one? Because I, I know the context, you see. And I would go through the same thought process as my predecessor attorney general, that we should not be targeting our political enemies and selectively enforce our law. So you agree with the norm, we should not use the power of prosecution against a political enemy. That should not... that should not be the way the law enforced... the law is enforced. No, we are, we are better than that as a nation. Okay. So... You're not the attorney general anymore, and Mr. Severino is no longer the attorney general, either. (laughter) - Resigned. TANG: The president finds another acting attorney general who will investigate Farmer Jon. Mr. Tester, you are under the most intrusive level of audit that the IRS can perform. And I'm curious, what's happening in your life now that you've been targeted in this way by the president? Are your kids, your spouse, are they affected? You've got to defend yourself. That's additional resources that are going out the door, in a marginally... uh, financial situation. TANG: Yeah. So, it would probably push you over, you'd lose the farm quicker. You mentioned your bank account. TESTER: Yeah. - With lawyers' bills... TESTER: Yeah. - You've hit empty. Yeah. TANG: So you call your niece, who is, after all, the greatest niece in the world. Sarah, you call around to some law firms. And crickets. No one is willing to represent the farmer who is the president's outspoken critic. What's happening? Why not? Obviously, the president's threats have worked and it's chilling people from wanting to stand against the administration. Is that a problem? Yeah. (laughter) TANG: But why? I mean, are we really worried about elite DC, New York, San Francisco lawyers who are being cowed into silence? They're going to be fine, they're rich. How does it affect Americans? Legal representation is at the foundation of our adversarial system. If you're being accused of a crime under investigation, just being under investigation alone will really require having legal representation. Great legal representation, ideally. And so, if lawyers don't feel free to take on unpopular clients because of the political atmosphere, then we've lost what we founded this country to do. TANG: Mr. Brat, one final word. BRAT: Yeah, I just want to weigh on this... this-- the moral issue here and the legal issue is clouded by the fact that this President Power guy was targeted back in '16. You have some concerns. BRAT: A few. - About the other side... BRAT: Yes, yes. TANG: ...using prosecutorial power. This is nothing new, in other words. TANG: I understand. Yes. We're going to fast forward a little bit, because I have some news. There's a special election in Middlevania. And our winner of the election is none other than Attorney General Dan Goldman. Senator Goldman, congratulations. Thank you so much. (laughter) TANG: So, the House and the Senate were under control of the Powerton party by the slimmest of margins, and the Senate was 50 to 50. So that one election flips control. Which means, Senator Ryan, congratulations. You are now the Senate majority leader. You've got power, maybe you've got some options. so you are hosting a strategy call with some other prominent members of your party. It's on Zoom. Senator-elect Goldman has joined the Zoom call from his phone. Mr. Tester is on the call. He is gaining some prominence in the party, considering a run for public office himself. Help us think through what the opposition party's strategy should be. Should you resist President Powerton at all costs or try to reach across the aisle and find common ground? From kind of the power struggle that we were talking about here earlier, I think it would be constructive. I think the American people want to see us working together. TESTER: Absolutely, unequivocally. You reach across the aisle, you try to find people that you can work with on the other side of the aisle and within your own party to retake the legislative branch's... power. TANG: Hold on, I'm sorry. Hold on. You were under investigation... TESTER: Yeah. From President Powerton's Department of Justice. - Yep. TANG: An IRS audit. You were almost bankrupted, you almost lost the farm. Yeah. TANG: And now you want to work together? Yeah. With his administration, his party? I, I work with the people in the Congress to come up with a plan to take the power back that the executive branch has taken from the legislative branch. TANG: Wow. - Absolutely. If, if you go in with personal axes to grind, and, "I want to just grind this ax," totally ineffective. And I want to be effective, I want to make sure this democracy works the way the forefathers intended. TANG: Senator-elect Goldman, are you in agreement? No. (laughter) I am salivating at the subpoena power. (laughter) TANG: You want to take it to the president? GOLDMAN: Well... You don't want to cooperate? I think you go on two different pathways. Um... The abuse of power through executive orders has to be reckoned with through oversight and, if necessary, through the subpoena power. TANG: The strategy call is difficult. You can see the opposition party struggling with the weight of governing. But while the Zoom strategy call is happening, all of a sudden... loud boom. There has been a terrible car accident. Somebody slammed into Senator-elect Goldman as he was getting out of his car. He's in the hospital. He's been badly injured, but he will survive. The driver of the vehicle was a 28-year-old man named Kent Knightley. He says it was an accident. Kent Knightley is tried, convicted of felony assault. President Powerton's most fervent supporters are sharing memes saying "Pardon Kent Knightley." Now, many of you are at a meeting with the president when he brings this up. "Have you guys heard how they're calling "this Kent Knightley kid a hero? "I think they might be right. I think I'm going to pardon him." Senator Christie? I would advise the president that, you know, he should look very carefully at the factors that are considered historically for these type of pardons to be granted. I would say to him, you know, it would be a very, very unpopular decision to do that. But it's his call. It's... It's the president's judgment. That's why we need to elect presidents with judgment. (laughter) TANG: We've got something really interesting happening over at this table. Constitution of the United States is out on the table. Chief Justice Duncan, Mr. Severino, working together, despite being on opposite sides, looking at the Constitution. Any thoughts? SEVERINO: Well, yeah, it goes back... DUNCAN: Excuse me, I'm not on a side. (chuckling) Fair enough. SEVERINO: On the side of the Constitution. (applause) - Touché. Touché. SEVERINO: So, it goes back to an earlier point: can you weaponize the justice system? And some political parties do, and some presidents do on occasion. Very recently, we've had that experience of weaponization. The pardon power is actually a check on that weaponization. If one president goes too far, the next president could pardon the people who are unjustly prosecuted for political reasons. TANG: Okay. - Yeah. TANG: The president likes what he's hearing. The president says... "Roger, absolutely." The other side, right, they... Maybe he should have kept him as attorney general. TANG (laughing): Maybe... he's rethinking it. JENNINGS: Well, the discussion in the room among the president's advisors is very simple. "Can" does not mean "should." And as a political advisor to the president, the correct thing to say here is, "You can do this, "but you have to ask yourself whether you should do it "as it relates to your own personal political influence in this country and your legacy." TANG: The president listens to everybody. He really appreciates what you said, Roger, and he says to you, "You know what? "The other side did this. "They were out there pardoning friends, family members. I'm pardoning Kent Knightley." Folks, the Powerton administration continues. It's a bumpy ride, but eventually he has to run for re-election, and ladies and gentlemen, he loses. He loses to a firebrand young governor named Dana Novo. Dana Novo is the president of the United States. Her vice president is somebody who's in this room, a citizen whose plain-talking style has connected with the American people. (laughter) Goldman. (laughter) TANG: Congratulations, Mr. Tester, you're now the vice president of the United States. - Perfect. (applause) - God, what a country. CHRISTIE: So sorry. I'm so sorry, Jon. - Yeah, I know. TANG: Only in America. - What was that about a warm bucket of spit? (laughter) TANG: You're going to have a chance, Mr. Vice President, to give some advice to your new president, President Novo, but right now she's on TV. She's on TV giving a speech. It's her first week in office, she's rallying the base. So here's what she says. She says, "We fought against "President Powerton's overreach at every turn. "There were no limits on what President Powerton could do. "Well, turnabout is fair play. "I am going to "defund an institution, an agency "that we all know is wasteful. "It's the Department of Defense. "$800 billion it spends. (panelist chuckling) "I'm issuing an executive order, "cutting spending by 20%. "The waste, we're going to find it, "and we're going to cut it, "and here's what we're going to do with it. "We're going to spend that money on the true source of "American national security, our public schools. "We're going to buy books, not bombs. I'm calling it Operation Education." Senator Christie, you, at the very beginning, made a comment that predicted a lot of this. You said, "You want to reduce funding at a federal agency, go through Congress." Now, a president of the opposing party wants to do the same thing. You could run a victory lap. You could tell us, "I told you so." It would be appropriate. Anything you'd like to say? Yeah, well, now you do a press conference. (laughter) Sure, now you definitely do a press conference, and, and you go after the current president for, I'm sure, that the current president had negative things to say about President Powerton trying to cut the GBB. So I would have my staff go and find those comments. And I would say, you know, the president is a hypocrite. TANG: Okay. CHRISTIE: That the current president isn't the flaming star you talked about, but is a flaming hypocrite... TANG: Is a hypocrite. - ...for, you know, having prosecuted the case against the GBB, but now is trying to do what I consider substantively the same thing. TANG: Mr. Severino, do you agree that President Novo does have the legal power to cancel spending at the Department of Defense? Cancel, yes. Reallocate spending that was appropriated is a different question. TANG: Got it. So you would tell members of Powerton's base that, yes, she can cut $160 billion in defense spending. What you can't do is buy your kids books or good teachers. Wouldn't frame it that way. (laughter) TANG: Do you have any regrets about making such bold claims to presidential power when Powerton was in office now that the shoe is on the other foot? SEVERINO: No, you have to be consistent about it. Now, unfortunately, we lost the Supreme Court, so now they have to apply by those exact same rules-- play by those same rules, so. TANG: Oh. Is that what you were going to say, Mr. Jennings? Absolutely. We had a legal point of view on it at the time, we lost. We tried to work with the Congress on it. The new administration-- by the way, I'd just like to get a little sympathy for Roger and I being unemployed at this point. (laughter) And... and that, you know, that's the rules of the road. Now you got to play by the, by the Supreme Court ruling. Are you a little bit grateful now that the shoe is on the other foot, that the Supreme Court, our third branch of government, has ruled against you on the first case? I'm neither grateful nor ingrateful. I just react to the circumstances as they exist in the moment. At the time, I was the president's spokesperson. We had a point of view, we lost, and now I expect every subsequent administration to abide by that or have their own point of view. And when I'm, you know, the next administration's spokesperson, I'll... (chuckles) I'll abide by their point of view at that time as well. He's enjoying his time in the private sector right now. (laughter) TANG: Chief Justice Duncan. As you know, the Supreme Court establishes precedent in every case. It's not necessarily bound, except to the extent that it wishes to be viewed as consistent by what prior Supreme Courts have held, but they are very clear about the facts of a case and whether those facts are on all fours. Subsequent facts. JENNINGS: I will give you some political advice, though, which is that there's a big darn difference between canceling Farmer Jon's solar panels and turning off the national security of the United States. And I do appreciate that, and if I took political advice, I would value it. (laughter and applause) TANG: Senator Ryan, Vice President-elect Tester, Senator Goldman, you are sitting in the Oval Office when President Novo comes into the office after the speech, and she's looking for high-fives. "We did it. We took it to them. Everything Powerton did," right? "We're using it on him now. This is great. It's our moment." Senator Goldman, would you support her effort to use bold claims about presidential power for what she believes is good? No, I, I think that you've got to follow the law. And that the law has to be adhered to, regardless of which party. And unfortunately for our party, we generally take the high road and make sure that we follow the law, whereas... sometimes that's not always the case in President Powerton's party. That's why he's the junior senator from our state. (laughter) TANG: Mr. Vice President. This country's been around for nearly 250 years and, and we've got a constitution that is really the basis for this country moving forward. Follow the Constitution. Mr. Vice President Tester has made a powerful plea to his president, "Please don't do this." Is that what you're saying? That's exactly correct. TANG: Please don't do this. I am president of the Senate, as vice president, so yes. TANG: You are president of the Senate. President Novo looks at you and she shakes her head. She says, "No, this is the way the game is played now. And as you shuffle out of the Oval Office, you hear her call out something that sends shivers down your spine. She says, "Bring me my attorney general. I've got a long list of political enemies." We have one more question for all of the panelists. We've seen a lot unfold today. Some bold claims to power by presidents from two very different parties. Maybe you were okay with some of those power plays. But maybe you were deeply troubled. My question for you is this: is there anything that we can do better, anything we can agree on for how to move our country forward? ISGUR: The source of a lot of these problems is Congress has dwindled in power and prestige. The American people should be holding Congress accountable for actually doing their job, whether it's passing appropriations, reining in executive power, insisting that their laws be actually passed, holding investigations when they're not. None of that is happening. And if you don't rein in executive power when it's your guy in office, then we're just on this never-ending cycle. TANG: Senator Ryan. I think we need leaders with guts. Like we need leaders with, with courage that are able to not just tell the opposition no, but to tell your own party, sometimes, no. No, you're crossing a line. TESTER: You've got to start talking to one another, and you've got to develop trust. And that's how you do it, and you use the Constitution as the foundation for moving forward. Congress can't be AWOL. GOLDMAN: I think the Senator Tester is correct that we have to be able to... TESTER: Vice President, please. (laughter) RYAN: Way to go, Jon. - So sorry. (laughter) That's why he's a freshman. (laughter) I... I think Mr. Vice President Tester is correct that we do need to be able to sit down and figure out a solution. But before we get there, we need everybody to commit to wanting to find a solution. SHORT: Strongly agree that Congress has abdicated a lot of responsibility. But, you know, next year, we celebrate 250 years of our country. And I think that we don't often appreciate what an amazing system our founders created. But our founders also said it's for a moral and highly educated people. And I think that, right now, we have a system that's electing performance artists in the highest levels of, of government. And until the American people reclaim that responsibility, I think you're going to continue to have challenges. And I think it, it ultimately-- the system is working the way our founders intended, but it's the responsibility of the American people and the voters to elect people of high moral character who honor their oaths. You know, power is so intoxicating, as we know. And so, to place that power in someone who doesn't have the character to exercise it responsibly, as the president of the United States, this is very, very dangerous. One last question. Folks, is there any reason for hope? JENNINGS: I'm hopeful. As long as we can speak and speak to each other, and debate each other, and vote and then do it all again two years later... it will-- it will all work out, because this experiment is working, in my opinion, even through troubled times. STAHL: I'm not hopeful. TANG: You're not hopeful? STAHL: I look at our institutions, all of which have lost the respect and trust of the public. I worry about the future of democracy, obviously. And I don't see the path out. So, I'm kind of down. TANG: Roger Severino. Well, I'm hopeful because the American people, you never want to bet against them. And our system allows course correction. We've gone through a massive course correction, so I'm much more hopeful now than I was just a few months ago. And that really goes to the genius of our system. You knew what you're getting once, you try it out, you see something different, you don't like it, you switch back. What really gives the, the fundamental hope for us being able to go through all these problems, still go home as Americans united because we know our democracy is what holds us together. This democracy is exactly what our founders represented it to be, which is not perfect. And they say it right in the beginning of the Constitution, it was an effort to form a more perfect union. And so, to me, I'm hopeful, because I look at all the other alternatives out there-- I'm not moving. TANG: John Tester. The young people that I've been around are going to do a hell of a lot better job of running this country than my generation. And I firmly believe that. And I think, I tell them all the time, "Make a difference. Run for office. "And then when you get in, follow your gut, because you got a better one than my generation has." TANG: And with that, folks, we bid farewell to Middlevania, until the next time. (applause) - Thank you. - Thank you. - Appreciate it, thank you. - Thank you so much. - Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you, Roger. Appreciate it. Thank you. ♪ ♪ ANNOUNCER: For more about "Breaking the Deadlock," visit us at pbs.org/deadlock. ♪ ♪ "Breaking the Deadlock" is available on am*zon Prime Video. ♪ ♪

Black Death from Lucy Worsley https://www.pbs.org/video/the-black-death-nr73de/ VIDEO- FULL TRANSCRIPT- FULL VIDEO ♪♪ -In 1348, the Black Death struck the British Isles and spread like wildfire. It's believed to be the most deadly pandemic in history. Before the Black Death, the population of mainland Britain was around 6 million. Two years later, only an estimated 3 million were left alive. Why did this disease claim so many, and how did the awful death toll change Britain? In this series, I'm reinvestigating some of the most dramatic and brutal chapters in British history. It wasn't just one generation. It was three generations losing their lives. Bum, bum, bum. These stories are part of our national mythology, harboring mysteries that have intrigued us for centuries. It's chilling to think that this could actually be evidence in a murder investigation. But with the passage of time, we have new ways to unlock their secrets using scientific advances and a modern perspective. It's a horrible psychosexual form of torture. -Absolutely. -I'm going to uncover forgotten witnesses, re-examine old evidence, and follow new clues to get closer to the truth. -It is one of the great British mysteries. -It was one of those moments, I'm afraid, for a historian that makes the hair stand up on the back of your neck. [ Crow caws ] ♪♪ ♪♪ -Bubonic plague, the pestilence, the great mortality. There's lots of different names for the Black Death, infamous for the horrible boils or buboes that break out on peoples' skin. It struck Britain many times, famously in London in 1665. But I'm interested in the first and the worst outbreak in 1348 when something like half of the population got wiped out. I want to investigate how the Black Death transformed society, what happened to it during and after this terrible medieval pandemic. ♪♪ First, I want to understand what the Black Death was and why the outbreak in Britain in 1348 was so deadly. After all this time, science is still uncovering new clues. Stored in this underground vault in London are 600 skeletons. Each box contains the bones of someone buried in a mass grave at the height of the plague outside the old city walls. This plague pit was unearthed in the 1980s during building work and excavated by archeologists. Strangely beautiful thing. -It is. -His teeth. Look at his teeth. -I know, they're fantastic, aren't they? -Osteologist Jelena Bekvalac is curator of this collection. These are definitely Black Death victims. But for centuries, science was uncertain what caused the disease. Then in 2011, DNA taken from the teeth of these skeletons confirmed what had actually killed them. This has been a great mystery, hasn't it, for 700 years, at least. -Yeah, we had these individuals, and then scientists used the DNA analysis recreating and reconstructing an ancient genome. And by doing that, they were able to identify that the actual causative agent was a bacteria and it was Yersinia pestis. -What did you say? -Yersinia pestis. -Yersinia pestis. -Pestis, yes. -And why was this particular bacterium quite so dangerous? -This one was particularly virulent to us because we, as a population at that time, had never been exposed to that bacteria. So there was no immunity within us. And therefore, when you're exposed to something that's new, it really then impacts onto the population. And subsequently, after that episode of the Black Death that we know killed so many people, there were other outbreaks, but it didn't have that same impact. -Because of herd immunity. -Because of herd immunity, yes. So you're building up that lovely sort of immunity to it. -We all know what herd immunity is now. -[ Laughing ] Yeah, yes. -So just at the moment he was going into the plague pit to be buried, I imagine that he would have had big swelling buboes on him. Is that right? -Yes, that would be where you get the swellings in the armpits and the groins. -What is that exactly, these swellings? What was it? Is there something inside them? -Well, there'd be nasty, dead cells and pus and poison. -Ah. -So very uncomfortable, be very sore, probably have horrible headaches, feel very sort of fatigued, might feel sick, sweats. You'd feel really, very, very unwell and under the weather. -And where did this particular bacterium come from? -Well, they believe that it probably came from Central Asia and then it would travel across, because also we have to remember at this time that you've got trade routes and people are moving around, so you've got quite a lot of movement of people. So it probably started from there. -Emerging global trade routes in the 14th century exposed Britain to a deadly new disease. It had raged through Asia and Europe, wiping out millions before arriving on these shores. Catch it and you could be dead in days, even hours. So how did this bacterium spread so aggressively and kill so many people? There are some images of life in London that got burned into my mind at an early age, and this is one of them. It's a scene from the kiddie version of the story of "Dick Whittington and His Cat." Dick Whittington, being a lad who came to London to seek his fortune, but who had to sleep in a horrible attic infested with rats. Here they all are running over his bed, climbing out of the window. And I'm pretty sure it's images like this, if not this very one, that made a link in my mind between the spread of the plague and rodents. But I agree this isn't exactly solid scientific or historical evidence. I'm going to have to do better than the Ladybird version. What can the latest science tell me about how this disease might have spread? A study from 2018 argues that the Black Death was also spread by human fleas and lice, infecting people as they bit into their flesh. One of the researchers was epidemiologist Dr. Fabienne Krauer. She's in Switzerland, so this will be an online consultation. So, Fabienne is in my waiting room. Let me admit her. There she is. Fabienne. So there's these human fleas that can take the plague from one human being to another human being. -Yes, it's interesting. Lice and fleas were very common in the 14th century. -So, would that be through people's bedding or their clothes, or how can you see that working? -Yeah, so body lice and human fleas, they typically live in clothes, in the seams or in the foldings of clothes. So we know that in the 14th century, the handing down of clothes, that was a real thing. And we think that this is how the plague could have spread, because people were passing on clothes of someone who died of plague, and then they got themselves infected. -Mm. This is so heartbreaking because people wouldn't have known, would they? They wouldn't have known that this is how they were actually killing their friends and relatives. -No, people had no idea. But there are also other forms of plague, such as pneumonic plague, which is transmitted directly between people through coughing, through infectious droplets. -Sorry, sorry, sorry. Fabienne, just for a second, 'cause this is all so new to me. You're taking me into new ground here. Did you call it the pneumonic version of the disease, like pneumonia? -Yes, exactly. So pneumonia happens when someone who has a plague infection, when these people cough, they expel infectious droplets. And these can be inhaled by other people, which cause primary pneumonic plague in these people. And that's a very fatal and rapidly progressing disease. -So it spreads -- it can also spread through the air from someone you're living with, someone you're in the same room as, and it's to do with breathing the disease, one person to another? -Yes, it requires rather close contact. So it's usually people within the same household that are infected, or people who care for someone who is sick. -That's a horrible idea, isn't it? Someone who's taking care of somebody could be infecting themself through their compassion. -Yeah, that's -- that's indeed horrible. And if someone had pneumonic plague, then their fate was basically sealed. So they were going to die, for sure. And the fatality for pneumonic plague was about 100%. -100%? -Yeah. ♪♪ -So much new information here. I hadn't realized that there were these different variants within plague. There's the bubonic plague, where you get the swellings in the armpits, but also the pneumonic plague, which is lung to lung. And Fabienne's talking about so many different vectors of transmission. We've got the rats and the fleas. There's also body lice and the secondhand clothing and just being together in a small space. No one was immune to this disease. Rich or poor, young or old, the Black Death ripped through all levels of European medieval society. Now, what I do know about medieval society is that at the top of it, we have the king, and then below him we have his knights. Here they are. [ Imitates galloping ] These gentlemen give him their loyalty. He gives them their land. But the vast majority, 90% of the population, are in fact made up of all these guys, the peasants. And most of them aren't free. They're tied to the land from which they scratch a living, land that's owned by the local lord of the manor, and the whole of the social structure is reinforced by the church. Each Sunday, the priest preaches to his parishioners that this is the way the world is. This is God's grand design. ♪♪ How did the Black Death transform this rigidly structured society? I want to investigate the world of the vast majority of its victims, the rural peasants. But contemporary descriptions of how they lived can be misleading. According to these images, it looks rather lovely. Here's a happy agricultural worker enjoying the spring air, sowing his seeds in the ground, surrounded by birds and leaves. Ahh. And here are some farmers bringing in a wonderful crop of corn. Looks blissful. But these images are from the "Luttrell Psalter." It's a really fantastic illuminated manuscript commissioned by Luttrell himself, a landowner. He wanted to make living on the land look like it was a lovely thing to do. I'm not sure how reliable these images are as a guide to everyday life. ♪♪ Firsthand accounts of 14th century peasant life don't exist. Most people were illiterate. There were no gritty life stories to consult. Though they did pay taxes and rent to their noble overlords. To understand how the majority lived 700 years ago, you follow the money. In 14th century England, rural peasants were summoned before a court of the manor on which they lived and worked to pay rent and tax. These transactions were recorded in court rolls, and they covered every aspect of peasant life. Fines were paid for disobedience of any kind, like leaving the manor without permission. Tax was paid on crops grown on the parcel of land you leased from the Lord. When you died, your family paid a death tax to inherit the lease on that parcel of land. ♪♪ In the county of Suffolk in a temperature-controlled vault are some of Europe's rarest medieval manuscripts. They're the court rolls of a small Suffolk village called Walsham le Willows. I do know my way to the Suffolk Archives 'cause I've been there before, but the stuff I normally look at is much later than this. These court rolls cover the period before, during, and after the Black Death struck England in 1348. What can they tell me about the peasantry and the impact of the pandemic on their lives? Oh, wow, look, they're all out on the table for me already. Oh, and aren't they fantastic? So we're looking at lots and lots of very neat Latin here. It's so neat, it's got a sort of Excel spreadsheet quality to it. But I know that buried underneath that are real human beings, even if they're treated here as units of taxation, almost. Now, I know that this set of documents is so important because it's so comprehensive. It goes on for years and years and years in the same village, and you don't normally get that sort of longitudinal view into the life of a community because one bit might survive, another bit not. So this is just remarkable this, the completeness of this record for 14th century Walsham. The rolls are written in medieval Latin. Fortunately for me, there's an English translation. Mm, I did study medieval Latin, but a long time ago and not very seriously. So I'm having to rely on my translation here. The population of Walsham prior to the Black Death was around 1,200. Plague strikes the village in June 1349. The court session for that month shows a huge spike in death tax being paid. And it was a very busy court session because basically 103 people have all died. So that's in the last three weeks in this particular sitting at the court. They had to deal with the business of 103 deaths. It's extraordinary. And you can see that the clerk has run out of room. He's gone down the first piece. He's had to attach another one to keep going. And what's kind of chilling is that he doesn't care that these people have died. What he cares about is that there's business to be done, because every time you die, when you are a serf, your family has to pay a tax to the landlord. And that tax is called a heriot. And in some cases, the heriot is a horse. And in other cases, it's a yew. So basically, when your father dies, you have to give the landlord one of your animals. There's clearly good money to be made. But the 103 deaths listed in this court session are just the heads of families. Younger men, women, and children, a good 80% of the community, aren't recorded. They're not economically relevant to the records. Factor them in, and the deaths must number close to 600. So that's half of the village dying of plague, matching estimates for the whole country. These rolls of a micro study for all of Britain during the pandemic. And here's a particularly interesting family who are marked out with a cross for some reason. I can make out their name is Cranmer. That's William Cranmer, who's the patriarch of the family. He's the granddad. And he held a messuage -- that means a piece of property, possibly with a house on it. And it says he also held a tenement, and he's died, and he has to pay a heriot, the death tax. Then his son and heir, a second generation, he dies. And then there's -- and a third generation who die. His son Robert dies, and the heriot has to be paid. But this time, they haven't got any horses left. They have to pay a cow. It's a less good animal for that because the lord's already got the two horses. This particular family, the Cranmers, they stand out here because of the awfulness of what happened to them. It wasn't just one generation or two generations. It was three generations losing their lives. bum, bum, bum, all within the same few weeks in the same -- in the same village. ♪♪ The Cranmer clan seem like a typical peasant family. I want to investigate their life experiences to understand how Britain was changed by the plague. Armed with my copy of the court rolls, next stop for me is Walsham le Willows. 20 miles inland from the Suffolk coast, the present day village of Walsham still clusters around the local church, Saint Mary's, just as it did 700 years ago. So far, I've looked at Walsham during the time plague struck the village. But now I'm going to wind the clock back to the years just before the Black Death. What was pre-pandemic life like for the Cranmers? And is there any surviving trace of them left today? I need some local knowledge. Oh, hello, Frances. It's Lucy here. I am in Walsham. Left, and look for the school. I'm off to see a lady called Frances Jenner. She's the chairperson of the local history society, and she's one of those people who says, "Oh, I'm only an amateur historian," but actually, I suspect that she knows everything that there is to know. ♪♪ Like me, Frances is fascinated by the court rolls of Walsham, and she's been studying them for years. It was pretty agricultural in the 14th century. Is it still quite agricultural around here? -It is very much so. Still a very rural community. -So where are you bringing me, Frances? -I'm bringing you to Cranmer farm. -Oh, my goodness! -Yes. -Cranmer farm. Still got their name on it. -It does, yes. -700 years later. -It does, yes. -Though it's been rebuilt since. -It has. It's been rebuilt later, but they would have had a dwelling here, and they farmed the lands around here. -Do you think they farmed in this very field, then? We're totally in their neck of the woods? -Quite possible that they did and that we are actually walking on where they farmed and lived. -Excellent. And having spent a lot of time combing through the court rolls, have you developed in your mind the character at this William Cranmer, the eldest one, the granddad of the family? -I have, because actually, if you look at him, he actually has more entries than anybody else. And there are lots of instances of him being fined for various breaches of grazing too many sheep on the verges and all sorts of things. And I just get the impression that he was a bit of a one, really. -Oh, really? -I do. -A sharp operator? -I think so. Yes, definitely. That's what we would call him today. -Yes. And how hard or difficult do you think the lives of the Cranmers were living here? -Prior to the Black Death, there'd been seven years of famine due to the unseasonably odd weather conditions. -Ah. -Excessive rain storms, and we have to also remember that in those days, the wheat wasn't the wheat that we know today. It was really tall, so storms would basically flatten it and then it would just rot in the fields. So that would mean hardship. That would mean no food, no crops to sell. They would still have to pay the taxes to the lord of the manor. So they were being squeezed basically from both sides. They weren't actually making any money, but they still had to pay their taxes. So life would have been hard. They would have been hungry. They would have been poor. Life really would have been pretty miserable. ♪♪ -In these years of pre-pandemic hardship, old William Cranmer is frequently fined for keeping more animals than permitted, for taking firewood without permission, even for not informing on a neighbor when they break the rules. William might have a few acres of land, but there's three generations, his son, his grandson, and their extended families, all living on it. Perhaps there's just too many of them for the land to support. The Walsham court rolls list numerous villages in the same situation. While they struggle, they're also duty bound to work the lord's personal farmlands as well as their own. It's the same across swathes of Britain, but as I work through the court rolls, I come across another strain on the Cranmer clan's hard-pressed resources. You don't often get women mentioned in these court rolls because it's mainly about the tenants. But if you travel back in time, we seem to have a granddaughter of wily William Cranmer, the grandfather of the family. Her name's Olivia. And the reason that she comes up in the court records is because of a scandal. She's had to pay a child wite, which is a special fine of two shillings and eight pence, and she's had to pay this because she gave birth outside wedlock. She's had an illegitimate child. ♪♪ Having a child out of wedlock in medieval society was condemned by the church, but it wasn't uncommon. The problem was more practical. It was another mouth to feed. Who would provide? In Olivia's case, it was swiftly solved. Shortly after she's fined, the court rolls record Olivia marrying a Robert Hayes, a peasant with his own land holdings. Was Roberts the father? Was this a forced marriage? The rolls make no mention. Now that I've learned more about the Cranmers, I'm intrigued to know how they and so many like them reacted as plague approached Britain. In the summer of 1348, plague had spread across the English Channel aboard trading ships. Contemporary accounts agree that the first outbreaks in Britain were in Weymouth and Bristol. The disease caught fire and spread from the coast into the countryside. Now, Walsham might feel like it's in the middle of nowhere, but it isn't, and it wasn't in the 14th century either. It was connected, as the world was, through global shipping routes. Walsham is 100 miles away from London, but crucially, it's only 26 miles, or a day's walk, from the international port of Ipswich. Ipswich was just a day's sail from France. News of the Black Death's horrors found their way across the channel. Most accounts coming from Europe were utterly apocalyptic. And this sounds frankly implausible. He describes here a rain of frogs, snakes, lizards. and scorpions, thunderbolts and lightning. This sounds like crazy pub talk, but then, much more believably, he talks about the plague traveling via Genovese ships to Marseilles and then to Avignon, where... Oh, golly, where half the people have died. So once he's got to France, that's roughly only 24 hours journey away from this village, from this pub. You can imagine people here laughing, maybe, speculating, maybe really frightening themselves as they talked about it on a Friday night. ♪♪ Accounts like this reached Britain throughout 1348, well before the Black Death struck Walsham. But is there evidence in the court rolls that even rumors about plague changed people's behavior? Here's a meeting of the court from the autumn before the Black Death. And here we've got -- how many men? I think it's -- yes, it's 11 men in total who are in trouble 'cause they've not turned up to work. They get fined for not doing their duties, including William Cranmer, actually. What might they have been doing instead? Well, this might be in my imagination, but just up here, we've got some other men who were fined, who were punished, for brewing and selling ale in breach of the assize. I am tempted to think that these 11 men thought, "Right, the plague is coming. We're jolly well not going to go to work. We're going to go to the pub instead. Let's make merry, because tomorrow, we die." ♪♪ It might have seemed to many that doomsday was approaching. How did those in power try to prepare the population for what was coming? What was their message to the people? ♪♪ [ Bells tolling ] Belief in God was central to life in medieval Britain. Everyone attended church to be guided in all things, both on Earth and spiritually, by their local priest. With rumors of bodies piled up in the streets in the west of England, in the autumn of 1348, an official Black Death briefing was made from church pulpits. The king, Edward III, tells the Archbishop of Canterbury to write a letter with instructions for the people. It's to be read out from the pulpit across the country. And historians usually called this letter after its first word, which is "terribilis." Terrible. This was a mass communication filtered down from king to bishop to priest to peasant. "Terrible is God towards the sons of men. He allows plagues to arise, to torment men and drive out their sins. It is now to be feared that this kingdom is to be oppressed by the pestilence and wretched mortalities which have flared up in other regions." The message is it's real. It's here. It's coming to get us. And it's coming because you've all sinned. This announcement affected everyone. Everyone sinned. Breaking any of the Ten Commandments was a sin, but the medieval church was particularly obsessed with fornication. Olivia Cranmer was fined and would have served penance for having a child out of wedlock. There were tens of thousands like her across the country. They were an easy target. Some clergy were quick to blame plague on immoral women and their choice of dress. Okay, here we got some very naughty, sexy 14th century ladies who have got slashes in their dresses, revealing their figures and what they've got on underneath. And this lady here, her robe has got great big holes, enormous arm holes in it, so you can see her shape through it. And [laughs] the name of these holes is brilliant. They were known as windows into hell. ♪♪ The Church maintained that only prayer could quell God's wrath and stop the pestilence. But no amount of praying could halt the progress of this terrible disease. By November 1348, the plague had spread east across England. Accounts claim that in Bristol, only 1 in 10 survived. Plague had struck London and broken out in York. Everywhere, communities were decimated. Church cemeteries overflowed. Across the country, plague pits were dug. ♪♪ This is just the most heartbreaking image. It's one of the very earliest depictions, it's from 1349, of a plague pit. Here are bodies being buried. Look at the grief on the face of this man here with the spade. And here are crowds of new coffins being brought. And this would have been the scene all over Britain, all over Europe, where the plague spread. And to these poor people, it must have felt like the end of the world. ♪♪ Getting a decent burial was a hugely important medieval ritual. So plague pits were a shocking and sudden change in this society. With people surrounded by so much death, surely their spiritual beliefs were shaken. How did the church cope during the crisis? Medieval historian Dr. Claire Kennan specializes in the impact of the Black Death on faith and the Church in Britain. So Claire, explain this to me. People are suffering, they're praying. The prayer isn't working. -Mm-hmm. -But they still go on doing it. Why is that? -So, in the 14th century, everyone's very concerned with the health of their souls. And the belief is that when you die, you will inevitably spend some time in purgatory, which really isn't a very nice place. So what people want to do is really lessen the amount of time they're going to spend there, and they do that through prayer, through acts of repentance, and through giving money to the church. -So people are saying prayers, not necessarily to save their life, but to have a better death? -Exactly. -When the Black Death happens, then, how is the church going to respond? What are they going to do? Obviously, you've got a clergy who are effectively at the front line of this disease. They are working with people who are dying from a very, very transmissible illness. They're getting in very close contact. They're leaning in to listen to that last whispered confession. And so we do see a huge number of clergy dying, approximately 50% generally. But in some places, this is much higher. And, of course, this leads to extreme shortages. -So there's a big problem here for the church. How are they going to solve it? -The church brings in some really interesting emergency measures, and what I've got here is actually a papal license, which is granted to the archbishop of York so that he can recruit more priests. And it says, "Because of the mortality from plague, which overshadows your province at this time, not enough priests can be found for the cure and rule souls or to administer the sacraments." And this is actually a list of novices who are currently being pushed through the system, if you will. -So it's sort of like sending through the medical students to do the work of doctors. -Exactly, and what happens is that we actually get quite a lot of complaints about these new priests. One chronicler even says quite scathingly that they're no better than laymen. But it's important to remember that this isn't everyone's experience. And actually what we see during and after the Black Death is people turning to the church, possibly more than before. So we have lots of people going on pilgrimage to earn what I like to think of as brownie points so that when they do die, they're not in purgatory for too long. -By New Year of 1349, plague had infected so many in London that the English Parliament was prorogued. It was shut down. For a moment, no one, it seems, had oversight of the country as the Black Death ripped through England. By spring, plague had reached Wales. The cities of Leicester and Lincoln had been struck. Estimated casualties in Norwich were horrendous. Every day, it was getting closer to Walsham. ♪♪ The court rolls suggest plague finally reached the village of Walsham in April 1349. Among the first to die is William Cranmer the elder, Olivier's grandfather, swiftly followed by Olivia's father and her brother. Three generations of Cranmers dead in a matter of weeks. For two months, the Black Death tore through Walsham. Family after family lost loved ones. At some point, Olivia's husband, Robert, also succumbs. But I can find no mention in the court rolls during these terrible months of Olivia dying along with hundreds of other victims in Walsham, younger men, women, and children. Her name simply isn't mentioned. It was a new bacterium. There was no herd immunity. People didn't really understand how it spread. But in any case, there was no escape. If you were a peasant, you could not leave your community without the permission of your lord. You literally had to stay there, working the land, paying your tax, waiting to see if you'd live or die. By autumn 1349, the Black Death was raging in Ireland and Northumbria. Then the Scots invaded England, believing that God had sent the pestilence to punish their English foes. Unfortunately, they may have taken plague back to Scotland with them, where the disease flared up soon after. ♪♪ ♪♪ In 1350, the Black Death finally died out in the British Isles. In two years, the pandemic had claimed the lives of up to half the population. But eyewitness accounts of what life was like in the immediate aftermath of plague are scant. Those that survived are mainly written by clerics. And these rare fragments hint at a serious breakdown in society. Now, this is one of the best of them. It's by a monk from Rochester. His name is William Dean, and he's writing in 1350, so only just after the Black Death. He's still very close to it. His work's in Latin, but here's the translation. And this bit says, "Mortality destroyed more than a third of the men, women, and children. As a result, there was such a shortage of servants, craftsmen, and workmen and of agricultural workers and laborers that a great many lords and people all very well endowed with goods and possessions, were yet without all service and attendants." With millions of workers dead, I want to find out what effect that had on society once the plague had passed. Professor John Hatcher is an economic historian at Cambridge specializing in how the Black Death transformed Britain. John, can you tell me what happens when potentially nearly half the population of a country dies? -Well, it's a very special country at the time because of how agricultural it is. The land becomes abundant and people become scarce. So wages rise because workers are scarce. And the consequence of that, of course, is the landowners have the threat of a disorderly peasantry demanding far more in pay, but also they're demanding freedom from serfdom. And just to quote one of the commentators of the period, his world was turned upside down. -You'd think that it would cause total societal breakdown and chaos, but it doesn't really, does it? -No, it doesn't. -Why? Why is that? -If you compare it with modern times, what you've got is people, the bulk of the population, 80%, producing their own food. -Oh, so they -- -They have to plow the land. There may be death and destruction all around them. They have to keep supplying their own land. You haven't got huge supply lines for the majority of people today. Society would collapse because you've got so few people who are actually producing their own subsistence. -Yes. -But in those days, of course, the situation is very direct. -And what evidence is there that these people in the labor market were demanding higher wages? -So, the scarcity of labor makes itself felt immediately. People can get work anywhere. They can demand the wages that they want, and there's a splendid description of a plowman plowing in the finery of a noble. He's been given it. It's got a few holes in, but nevertheless, there is, with his plow in the mud, wearing the clothes of a nobleman, and the clothes have been handed to him as a bribe to stay in work, to keep working. -Wow. So if I were at the peasant level of society, ironically, the Black Death might be good for me if I survived because I'd have more access to more food. -Yes, absolutely. And also, of course, you inherited the property of your family. Sometimes a large number of family members would die in succession, leaving a single person with the property of five or six people beforehand. It was a transformation. -So did this new normal last? Perhaps, as you might expect, the ruling classes in England at least tried to make sure it didn't by rushing through a new national statute or law. This great long thing here is a copy of the Statute of Labourers from 1351, so just after the plague. The translation here tells us what it's all about. It says, "The king and the nobles have passed the statute against the malice of employees who were idle and who were not willing to take employment after the pestilence unless for outrageous wages." It says that they have to take employment for the same wages as before, or else they were going to get imprisoned. Hmm. Also says that you're not allowed to leave the town where you work to go and work elsewhere in the summer. But then they admit that this isn't going to work. You can go to help with the harvest if you live in Staffordshire, Lancashire, Derbyshire, Wales, or Scotland. That is going to be needed to make the country work. With the ruling classes trying to reinstate the old social order, but with the peasants gaining opportunities for a new life, what does this mean for farming communities like Walsham? And what happened to Olivia Cranmer? I know that all the male members of her family are dead. But Olivia survives. A single entry in the Walsham court rolls describes her fate. The lord of the manor wants rent and tax from the Cranmer lands. So a radical decision is made. Olivia is listed as heir and granted tenancy of around 40 acres of the Cranmer holdings. ♪♪ Now, I had been thinking of Olivia as a sort of a freak accident. If this were a newspaper headline, it might say, "Amazing -- Walsham woman does well out of Black Death." But have a look at this. You go through the court rolls, there are lots of other examples of women inheriting land from men. Here we've got Agnes Wodebite and Catherine Dethe, and over here we've got Alice Rampolye, and these women's names were appearing for the first time because for the first time, they're economically relevant. And I'm wondering if this is happening on a super local level in Walsham, what's happening across the nation? Is it possible there's evidence for other women coming out of the shadows, if you like, in the wake of the Black Death? Professor Caroline Barron has done extensive research into opportunities for women in post-plague London. -Inevitably, there was a great deal of confusion afterwards, but gradually, what you see is that women are emerging, holding down jobs, being apprenticed as girl apprentices to men and to women, taking over workshops and running them as successful enterprises after the Black Death. -So where a business owner had died, his wife might sort of be forced economically to take it over. -Yes, and you find after the Black Death that the city expects a widow to continue to train her husband's apprentices, and they encouraged her to run his business. And in fact, they actually made it possible for a woman who was a widow to become a free woman of London and have the economic privileges that a freeman of London would have had. -Interesting. Are there specific women that you've been able to research? -Well, in the immediate aftermath of the Black Death, quite interestingly, William Ramsay was the chief mason of the king, the master Mason. He died in the Black Death, and his daughter, called Agnes, clearly took over the business from him. We find her running his workshop, and although she was married, she kept her own name, or her father's name, and ran the father's business. -Wow. -And she is called Dame Agnes Ramsay in the records. -That's extraordinary. -They sort of recognize this position that she's achieved. So it shows you that women could do things. -Amazing. What's this record you've got here? Does this tell one of their stories? -Yes. This is the indenture of Margaret, the daughter of Richard Bishop of Seaford, near Lewes. And she's apprenticing herself to a man called John Pritchett, citizen and tollester, which means a toll collector, of London, and burgher. His wife, a tilde maker, which is a tent maker. -A tent maker. She's going to learn to be a tent maker. -She's going to learn the craft of the said burgher, so it's quite specific. Although she's apprenticed to the husband and wife, it says she's going to learn the craft of the wife and to be the apprentice. -Was this a bit like during the World Wars of the 20th century? The men weren't there and the women had to take over? -Absolutely. It's like the munitions factories in the First World War or Rosie the Riveter in the Second World War in America. It's all to do with a shortage of population. -As a new disease, the Black Death's impact was horrific. And for a short while, the death of half the population saw social order upended. Britain's peasant class tasted freedom and empowerment, and despite efforts to return things back to pre-plague conditions, many had seen their prospects change fundamentally, none more so than Olivia Cranmer. She does well enough out of her inherited land to retire with a pension in later life. She never remarried. The court rolls now name her Olivia of Cranmer, and it looks like she may have lived into her 60s, a ripe old age for the 14th century. Plague would return to 14th century Britain. With each new wave, herd immunity built up, but it took 300 years for Britain's population to get back to pre-pandemic levels, and the psychological impacts of the Black Death lasted generations. This image is the "Danse Macabre." It's one of the iconic images of the Black Death, isn't it? Skeletons enjoying themselves. It's really striking to me that it dates from well over a century after the Black Death of 1348. I think it shows the lasting psychological impact of the plague, which kept coming back and back again, and it made people re-evaluate life. If life was a dance with death, if death could come and take you at any moment, well, then better enjoy life while you can. -"Lucy Worsley Investigates" is available on am*zon Prime Video. ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪

KWL Live Q&A – Planning Your Books and Setting your Goals with Sarra Cannon [ youtube channel : https://www.youtube.com/@HeartBreathings ; B6 notebook : https://heartbreathings.com/my-new-b6-stalogy-writing-notebook/ ; ] URL https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NkpvGXVpAF0 VIDEO THOUGHTS AS I VIEWED 00:01:00 the winds in nyc, between skyscrapers, feels colder than the north pole at places 00:03:00 congrats,great experience [ https://www.kobo.com/ca/en/ebook/the-disappearance-of-vanessa-shaw ] 00:04:00 I concur, a year review is a good thing[ https://rmnewsletter.over-blog.com/2023/02/2023-art-summary.html] 00:05:00 Asked You didn't preorder it? She admitted she missed preordering dates, pre order is best practice, but what works for her wasn't preordering 00:08:00 What planners do you have in the works for 2025? 00:15:00 A5 planners, add pages 00:17:00 Plans tend to be what we want to add. We can't be productive every day 00:19:00 How to help indie authors use planners? Ask what do I need to track in my planner. coil planners can take up less space. think on how your planner will be used. 00:22:00 do you put notes in your planner? no she doesn't 00:28:00 she doesn't like writing on the slick surface, she prefers typing. she likes writing on the kobo device that is rougher Kobo journals you can use in the newest, 2024 , models [ https://www.kobo.com/ca/en/search?query=kobo+originals+journals&fclanguages=en] 00:31:00 what trends should authors be prepared for in the planning? More authors going wide, more authors going into audio, she has been around since 2010, and she has only three audio books but she is getting audio books of her best sellers done. So many , direct sales on their own website. how can diversify? sell as in many places as possible. Or do i want to shut out the noise for everyone diversifying and how do i sell my books. You have to plan goals but you have to be yourself She ha a course concerning game board strategy She recalls a year she set up three preorders, and it didn't work out for her. So she syas who does she really want to be as an author. Does she want to write every day. Do I want to put out as many books as possible and do i need to relax from burnout. She admits ,she want a tv show someday. She ask what does that version of me have that she doesn't have now. 00:37:00 It is great saying what you want out loud. If you want to know where to start with indie publishing Email us at writinglife@kobo.com They also have a great help center here: https://kobowritinglife.zendesk.com/hc/en-us 00:38:00 any methods to track a plan? How to make sure you are still on track? Question yourself, why is this going wrong? Biggies tool is review. Usually a couple of culprits. Do you like what you write? Have you listened to others and acting on what others want? Maybe your plate is to big and you are burned out? Have the courage to be honest with one self. 00:42:00 Is their pressure to jump into something new? yes, if i dont do this will i miss that chance. she gives examples where at conferences, where they did translations and it worked or kickstarter and it worked. so people start to think one has to do all and all gets executed poorly. The ebook is where we tend to start, so start there. She knows so many people who are six figure authors and they say, they are burned out. and it is ok, to nt work yourself to death 00:48:00 Do you have an example of a milestone you achieved where a planner helped? she has run different courses this year, she is raising kids, running courses, and writing and none of this would had happened without the planner. I SAY [ you need to know what tools or strategies others are using but you need to master yourself ] 00:52:00 Talk about your rough draft challenge? April it will be another challenge 00:56:00 great show, planned well:) her websites [ https://sarracannon.com/ ; https://heartbreathings.com/ ; https://www.youtube.com/@HeartBreathings ; https://www.youtube.com/@SarraCannon]

Secrets of the Dead Egypts Darkest Hour As I have always said, the Nilotic word, is connected. For me the idea that Kemet/Nubia/Aksum are disconnected is untrue, like Scotland/Ireland/England while each is separate they have been intermingled from ancient times, they are Nilotic, and based on Narmer it is clear that the boundary between Kemet side Nubia is like the historic boundary between usa side Mexico, at one time, most of the usa known in 2025 was Mexico. UNIFORM RESOURCE LOCATOR https://www.pbs.org/wnet/secrets/egypts-darkest-hour-egypts-darkest-hour-about-the-film/4097/ VIDEO TRANSCRIPT -High in the cliffs near Luxor lies a mysterious mass grave. -Filled with bodies. Wow. What a nice foot. -Who were these people? -Generally, you don't get mass graves in Ancient Egypt. It's a very rare thing. -And how did they end up here? -Something like a mace struck him on the side of the head. These people have died bloody fearsome deaths. [ Suspenseful music plays ] -Now, archaeologists and scientists from around the world scour through the sands in search of clues to solve this mystery. -It's great. For me, it's great because it's the first time for me to get inside this pyramid. Really exciting. -From the Great Pyramids at Giza [ Wind whipping ] to the glaciers of Mount Kilimanjaro... -The fact that the pyramid was robbed means the government was losing control. -...a series of political crises... -Setting fire to a temple, a sacred place belonging to the king shows a direct attack against Pharaoh. -...and environmental catastrophes... -This represents a major drought. -...plunged Egypt and its people into anarchy... -If anything goes wrong with the Nile, then it would be famine and chaos. -...and triggered a dramatic civil war which would last almost 150 years. Were these mysterious bodies casualties of this war? If so, who were they fighting for? "Egypt's Darkest Hour." [ Suspenseful chords striking ] ♪♪ [ Suspenseful music plays ] ♪♪ ♪♪ -The desert cliffs of Luxor, in Southern Egypt... -[laughing] As-salamu alaykum. -...are home to an exceptional tomb. ♪♪ Dating back more than 4,000 years, long before Cleopatra, before Tutankhamun and Ramses, it's a rare mass grave. First discovered in 1923, it was sealed off and very few people have entered since. But, today, this unique grave is being opened for archaeologist Salima Ikram. -It's amazing to be able to go into this tomb. It's a huge privilege. No one's been allowed to go in for a long time and I've always wanted to go in since I was a baby Egyptologist, so this is a real treat. ♪♪ -Little is known about this burial site and Salima wants to find out who is inside, and why. -Door's open, but we have to wait for the air to clear a bit. There's still a lot of dust and there's still a lot of dead stuff. ♪♪ [ Suspenseful chord strikes ] ♪♪ -After half an hour, it's safe for Salima to enter. -Light saber. Finally, we can really go in and see this tomb for the first time. ♪♪ Shukran. Wow! -Carved out of rock by hand, the tomb consists of 200 feet of branching tunnels that reach back deep into the cliff. -It's like a labyrinth in here. It keeps on going. There are rooms and twists and turns and tunnels. It's fantastic! ♪♪ And it's filled with bodies. Wow! And lots of bandages. ♪♪ [ Grunts ] Here's a shoulder. You can see the scapula, a little bit of scapula here, and here's a humerus. So, so, it'd sorta be like this. You can see whoever it was was taller than I am, quite robust, probably male. ♪♪ Here, you can see all the folds of flesh. ♪♪ And over here, we have someone's leg. ♪♪ All these bandages would've been wrapped around the bodies, protecting them, allegedly, for eternity. -The tunnels contain the remains of least 60 people. ♪♪ -Just keeps on going. ♪♪ Oh! What a nice foot. Left foot with his big toe intact. Small toes have fallen off. Quite a large foot. It's probably male. -To add to the mystery, all the bodies seem to be male. -And here's its mate. They're all intact. ♪♪ -This grave is extremely unusual for Ancient Egypt. -There are huge numbers of bodies in here and, generally, you don't get mass graves in Ancient Egypt. -Normally, Egyptians were buried alone, or with their family. -But it's only when you have plagues or battles, where you might have a mass grave, like this one. It's a very rare thing. -Can science provide the identities of these bodies? ♪♪ French archaeologist Audran Labrousse is an expert on this period of Egyptian history, known as the Old Kingdom. To find out who these people were, he begins with an ancient text. Written by the poet Ipuwer, it's thought to describe Egypt at the time leading up to the mass burial. And Ipuwer's poem suggests something terrible happened to Egyptian civilization. -See now, the land is deprived of kingship. The king has been robbed, deposed by beggars. Every town says, "Let's expel our rulers." The people of the land weep because their enemies have entered the temple and burned the images. Upper Egypt becomes a wasteland. ♪♪ -According to the text, Egypt was in total chaos, which could help explain the dead in the mass grave. Some historians doubt the veracity of Ipuwer's text, rejecting it as exaggeration or pure fiction. However, Audran thinks there may be some truth to what the ancient poet wrote. ♪♪ Together with his colleague Philippe Collombert, he's come to Saqqara, where the pharaohs were buried in their pyramids, just south of Cairo. ♪♪ Between them, Audran and Philippe have spent more than 50 years studying the pyramids. Today, they've been given permission to open a very special pyramid they believe contains evidence explaining why the bodies were interred in the mass grave. -We're going now to the pyramid, the last pyramid, of the Old Kingdom and we're quite excited because we'd like to open it and to see exactly what is inside. ♪♪ -It will be very interesting to get inside the pyramid. It has been closed for years. And we have the luck, the chance, the privilege, to get to the sarcophagus and make a complete study of the monument. ♪♪ -It's just over there. You can see it in the background. ♪♪ And here we are. -Yes, the pyramid. ♪♪ -So here it is and it belongs to the Pharaoh Pepi II. -The story of the bones in the tomb starts with the end of Pepi's reign. Who was Pepi II? Pepi II came to the throne around 4,300 years ago, at the age of just six, 250 years after the Great Pyramids and the Sphinx were built. By this time, the pharaohs had ruled Egypt for about 700 years. This great civilization extended from the Mediterranean to Aswan. As pharaoh, Pepi was believed to be the son of a god and he ruled for at least 60, some say even 90, years, the longest reign in Egyptian history. ♪♪ His long reign gave him plenty of time to build a magnificent pyramid. Its grandeur demonstrates the extent of his wealth and power. -The main masonry of the pyramid is made of small stones cemented with mud, as to form a huge staircase toward the sky. Against these small stones, you had a thickness of about 5 meters of huge limestones blocks. -And, finally, on top of this, the outer layer of the pyramid, made of the finest, whitest, limestone in all of Egypt. -This casing covered the pyramid on 50 meters high and a golden top was added. It must have been a very impressive monument. ♪♪ -The funerary complex had a temple dedicated to Pepi and included small, satellite pyramids for his spirit and three medium-sized pyramids where his wives were entombed. But this magnificent pyramid was to be the last of this golden era. After Pepi's death, around 4,200 years ago, traces of the Old Kingdom disappear into the sand. Perhaps the turmoil written about in Ipuwer's ancient poem was real. ♪♪ [ Conversing in Arabic ] Audran and Philippe are entering the pyramid to find out what was happening in Egypt at this time. -[ Speaking in Arabic ] -Audran mudir! [ Conversing in Arabic ] -But the pyramid isn't giving up its secrets easily. -So we're in it now. We're approaching the entrance of the Pharaoh Pepi II. [ Suspenseful chord strikes ] ♪♪ -It's taken the workers more than four days to dig down through nearly 15 feet of sand. ♪♪ -We are nearly coming to the end of the work. We still have some bit of sand to take out of the entrance and we will be in it. -Finally, the sealed entrance to the pyramid is revealed. -So, now, we're ready to start. We're gonna break the cement. ♪♪ -The pyramid was last studied in the 1930s and hardly anyone has had the privilege of entering it since. ♪♪ It is an amazing opportunity for Audran and Philippe. ♪♪ -It's great. For me, it's great because it's the first time for me to get inside this pyramid. Really exciting. ♪♪ ♪♪ -The passageway descends steeply and then levels off, continuing for about 85 feet directly into the heart of the pyramid. -Well, now, we're in the passage and just leading to the burial chamber. -At the very center, they reach the antechamber, which then leads to the burial chamber, where the pharaoh was laid to rest. -[gasp] Ooh la la la. Pssh! This is really amazing, amazing. ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ I'm really amazed by the state of preservation of this pyramid, with all these marvelous texts all around. It look like the painter just left yesterday and we're just coming afterwards. You see the green color and the white surface; even the line here, the black line, are still present. ♪♪ And, here, we have the sarcophagus with the inscription with the name of Pepi II. This sarcophagus is the master piece of the Old Kingdom. It's really huge and magnificent, really nicely done. -This massive stone sarcophagus weighs 11 tons. -The sarcophagus is made of a black stone but you have to imagine that it was covered of gold. The inscription was in gold and inside it was a thick, gold leaf. And you have also to imagine in front of the sarcophagus, filling the room, all the golden furniture, the vases, everything that the king needed in his afterlife. -And the walls of the chamber are covered in hieroglyphs of ancient Egyptian religious texts. ♪♪ -All these texts are ritual texts for the rebirth of the king in the afterlife. -For Audran and Philippe, the interior of the pyramid reveals the state of the country during Pepi's reign and the events leading to the mass grave. -When you see the sarcophagus, with all these marvelous texts all around, that shows that, at the beginning of the reign of Pepi II, the state is still really powerful. -Egypt is triumphant. -But Philippe and Audran have spotted signs that things changed. For one, the pyramid was looted. -As you can see, the sarcophagus has been opened up and all that was inside has been robbed and taken out. -Including Pepi II's mummy, which has never been found. -When the robbers arrived, they pushed the lid of the sarcophagus, opened the coffin, took the royal mummy, throw it away. And, of course, all this gold, it was fabulous. They took everything out and the archaeologists found absolutely nothing in this room, unfortunately. [ Sinister music plays ] -Back at the entrance tunnel, Audran is studying evidence which shows that the pyramid must've been robbed shortly after Pepi's death. After Pepi was buried, the original passage was sealed with massive stone blocks, but the looters found a way around them. -Here, we see the evidence of the pillaging of the pyramid. The looters break the façade. -They then dug through the limestone brickwork, until they bypassed the stone blocks. -The looters cut the lintels and went into the descending passage. -Farther on, they dug a second tunnel above the main passage. It's now been filled, but Audran has found traces of it. -The looters arrived to this lintel. They break it. You can see some traces above. -Why did they dig this second tunnel? -The passage was blocked by three unpenetrable granite portcullis. -Today, they are raised, but, at the time, these massive, granite blocks barred the way. The looters had to dig through the softer limestone to get around them. [ Suspenseful music plays ] ♪♪ -They came down here, after the third portcullis, and then, their passage was clear to the funerary chamber. -The efficiency of the looters' route belies when they broke in. -It means that the looters knew perfectly the plans of the pyramid. They had in their crew somebody who had built the monument and it shows that this must have happened shortly after the death of Pepi II. [ Sinister music plays ] -Looting the pyramid so soon after Pepi's death is a sure sign the country was in turmoil. -When they took out the mummy of Pepi II, first, of all, it was a very big sacrilege. -Ancient Egyptians believed they needed their body to live again in the afterlife, which is why mummification was so important to them. -Destroying his body means that Pepi II will never be able to live again. That's real death for the pharaoh. -Protecting the pharaoh's mummy was a critical task. -The pyramid was closed after the burial of the king and it was guarded by a lot of people around the pyramid, so nobody could approach. The fact that the pyramid was robbed means that the state, the government, was not controlling anything here. [ Suspenseful music climbs ] [ Suspenseful chord strikes ] -And that's not all. Nearby, next to Pepi's father's pyramid, Audran has found more evidence that the country was in trouble shortly after Pepi II died. -We are here in one of the storerooms of the temple of Pepi I. And you can see that the stones are black, they are burned, and it shows a very violent and destructive fire. The fire, of course, was deliberate. -Crucially, Audran's team was able to date this fire. -We were able to date the fire by radiocarbon and it dates from the end of the Old Kingdom. [ Flames crackling ] -The date of the fire supports Audran's theory: that Pepi II's pyramid was pillaged not long after his death. -Setting fire to a temple, a sacred place, belonging to the king, shows a direct attack against power, against royalty, against Pharaoh. -Shortly after he died, law and order broke down to such an extent, his pyramid, and those of his family, were robbed and desecrated. [ Flames crackling ] More evidence to suggest Ipuwer may have been telling the truth. -The king has been robbed. The people of the land weep because their enemies have entered the temple and burned the images. ♪♪ -What happened? How and why did the pharaohs lose control and how did this lead to the dead in the mass grave? All over Egypt, archaeologists are finding signs of the growing political problems that were festering before Pepi II's death. ♪♪ As Pepi's reign continued and he grew older, he began ceding more and more power to his provincial governors. ♪♪ 500 miles south of Saqqara, on the banks of the Nile, lies the necropolis of Qubbet el-Hawa. It's here that the governors of Southern Egypt are buried and, with them, striking evidence of their growing influence. Archaeologist Martin Bommas -As-salamu alaykum. -has been digging here for three years. Comparing the tombs of governors from the start and end of Pepi's reign, he points out signs that their authority was increasing over time. [ Suspenseful chord strikes ] -Here we are, right at the entrance into the Tomb of Harkhuf, the governor of Upper Egypt, at roughly the time when Pepi II was a child and, as part of his role, he went to Nubia four times, to bring back exotic goods, like leopard skin, elephant tusks, and so on. ♪♪ [ Suspenseful chord strikes ] ♪♪ He was sent out by the king, obviously. The king financed all these expeditions. What is really interesting is that, although Harkhuf was one of the most important men in the region, really running the business here, he still had to ask Pepi II for permission to build his tomb. -At the start of his reign, Pepi II was very much in control of the country. -When we look into the political situation of Egypt at this point in time, we see that the king is still very strong. -But during the course of his long reign, things changed and those changes are reflected in the style and construction of the governors' tombs. Because, as grand as this grave is, it's nothing compared to the tombs of two governors from the latter part of Pepi's life, which are at the far end of the necropolis. The first one belonged to a governor of Elephantine. -Look at the size of this tomb and look at the columns, how high they are. That gives us an idea about the importance of the governor of Elephantine. Eighteen columns here. It's almost like a forest of columns. -The majesty of this tomb illustrates Pepi II's weakened authority, while the regional governors were becoming increasingly important. And the adjoining tomb, belonging to his son, is even more elaborate. -Now, look at this lavish painting here, that shows Sabni on a boat, on a river, but not during this life. It's the next life. It's the beyond. -The painting, together with the sheer size of the tomb, tells a story of wealth and influence. -If we relate what we see here to the beginning of the reign of Pepi II, like what we've seen in the tomb of Harkhuf, this clearly points out that, by the end of Pepi II's reign, when he was an old man, local governors had more power. ♪♪ -And this situation was replicated across Egypt. Pepi II gradually relinquished more power and control to the local governors. -Suddenly, local governors had too much power, compared to the power that was decreasing in the capital. -A political crisis was brewing. Then, at the age of 94, Pepi II died, and the fragile political situation finally unraveled and so began a series of events that led to the remains in the mass grave. [ Flames crackling ] ♪♪ There are hardly any traces of Pepi II's successors. Audran has been searching for these kings for years. One of his few sources of information provides insight into the leaders who followed Pepi. -We are lucky enough to have the list of Abydos. It is a list engraved on a temple, giving the names of all the kings of Ancient Egypt. And we have the names of five sons of Pepi II. -None of Pepi II's five sons reigned for very long. -The first successor of Pepi II was called Merenre II and we know, according to the Greek historian Herodotus, he was murdered after a very short reign of two years. ♪♪ -And his brothers didn't last much longer. -We know that Pepi II has a very long reign, between 60 and 90 years. So, his sons were very old when they arrived at the throne. Perhaps they just die because they were too old. -After his five sons, the crisis worsened and the Abydos list shows 13 more kings in quick succession. That's 18 kings in roughly 50 years. The Old Kingdom was clearly in freefall. ♪♪ To this day, archaeologists have not been able to find any physical evidence related to these kings. With the exception of one. It might not look like it, but this uninspiring pile of rubble is actually the remains of a pyramid. It belonged to Qakare Ibi, the fifteenth king after Pepi II. ♪♪ And it's tiny: less than half the height of Pepi's pyramid. ♪♪ The small size of Ibi's pyramid illustrates how weak the royal authority had become following Pepi II's reign. And, after Ibi's, it seems, no pyramids were built for about 200 years. ♪♪ [ Horn toots ] [ Poignant tune sweeps ] What was happening in the rest of the country, while the power of the pharaoh was waning? 400 miles to the south lies El Mo'alla. ♪♪ Once again, the style of a tomb signifies how the local governors responded to this succession of ephemeral kings. Archaeologist Antonio Morales explains. -This is Ankhtifi, the owner of this tomb, the local ruler of Hefat, the third province in Upper Egypt. -Ankhtifi governed in the tumultuous years between Pepi II's death and the creation of the mass grave. -These inscriptions tell us a lot about social disruption, civil war, conflict, lack of order or control by the central administration. There was a big gap of royal control of the country. -Most tomb walls are covered with references to the ruling king, but not here. -This is the only place in the whole tomb where Ankhtifi mentioned the name of a king. The rest of the tomb does not have a single mention to any king, which probably means that, with the passing of time, the central government lost control of the country and Ankhtifi felt that he was the single power in his province. -And, on his tomb walls, he's portrayed himself as king and ruler of his province. -He used kinds of phraseology, expressions, and even iconography that usually was used during the Old Kingdom, only by the kings. This section of the inscription says "I am taking care of the orphan. I am giving a boat to the one who cannot cross the Nile." By doing this, he was somehow comparing himself to the king, since these kinds of expressions referred to the capacity of the king to provide for his people and his country. -It seems that, after Pepi's death, rather than submitting to a rapid succession of weak pharaohs, the local governors, like Ankhtifi, decided to rule for themselves. The regional governors began jockeying for power and the inevitable consequence was civil war. -Some of the inscriptions in the tomb of Ankhtifi talk a lot about civil war. Here, for example, we have the verb "to attack, to fight," and includes the determinative of man with a stick and he's expressing how he was going to attack the Theban province. ♪♪ So, we have a situation of social disruption, civil war, conflict. ♪♪ [ Tranquil tune plays ] -All of this supports what the ancient poet Ipuwer's work described. -The land is deprived of kingship. -Pepi II's heirs lost their grip on the country. Egypt split apart and plunged into chaos and war. [ Suspenseful music plays ] Salima thinks it's possible that the bodies found in the mass grave near Luxor perished in the civil war. -I've got some photos of men who were inside the tomb and a lot of them had horrible trauma. You can see, over here, there's a hole here and he's probably hit by, you know, a rock from a slingshot. This one's even worse, 'cause you can really see that there've been attacks here, on both sides. So, this is quite possibly something like a mace struck him on the side of the head and blew it out and killed him rather viciously. So, this was not someone who died in bed. This was someone who died in battle. And some of them actually had arrows going through their bodies. So, here's the arrow and so he was pierced through and he would've been lying, bleeding, on the battlefield, probably waiting to be rescued or slowly dying and having birds pecking at him. These people have died bloody fearsome deaths. [ Voices shouting ] -In addition to the brutal manner of their deaths, there are other clues to their identities. -They were buried with their bows and arrows. So, we have those. And this is really the clincher. ♪♪ This one's got a wrist guard that goes all the way up and that's what archers wore to protect themselves from the bow's recoil. So, these people were archers themselves. So, all the evidence points to the fact that these were soldiers who died in battle. ♪♪ -But who were these soldiers fighting for, and why? ♪♪ ♪♪ The hieroglyphs on Ankhtifi's tomb reveal a catastrophic event that might explain. -Here, it says the whole southern country was dying of hunger, so that every man was eating his own children. ♪♪ Also, in this section of the inscription, it says, the whole country has become like a starving locust. That is a clear way for Ancient Egyptians to express that there was a dramatic famine in this section of the country. ♪♪ -Already politically weakened by the rise of the governors and the succession crisis after Pepi's death, a famine could have been the final blow that brought down the Old Kingdom. ♪♪ There is mounting evidence from all over the world that planetary forces could have caused such a famine. ♪♪ Scientists are discovering that, long before Pepi, Egypt wasn't the desert it is today. ♪♪ Back in Saqqara, Audran has found something revealing on the pathway leading to another pyramid, that of Unas, Pepi II's great-great-grandfather. -The wall of the causeway were covered with reliefs. Among them, one is specially interesting. What do we see? We see various animals. We see antelopes, oryx, gazelle, and among them there are small bushes and we see, for instance, here a very small gazelle, more or less sleeping among bushes. In fact, it's the representation of a savanna. -Audran believes these carvings show that Egypt once had a very different climate than it does today. -It means that, at the time of the Old Kingdom, the pyramids were not surrounded by a desert. They were surrounded by a savanna, very close to what we found now in Kenya. The necropolis was not a place of death. It was a place of life. -But are these decorations enough to prove these animals lived nearby and that the climate was so different? Or are these carvings simply fanciful illustrations of animals seen while on expedition? There should be scientific evidence, if Egypt's environment was radically different in the past. That evidence comes from a very unlikely source: crocodiles. ♪♪ To find out more, Salima has come here, to Kom Ombo Temple, where Ancient Egyptians worshipped the god Sobek, who had the head of a crocodile. She's here to examine an altogether different type of mummy. -One of the most important gods in Ancient Egypt was the crocodile god Sobek and, as a result, priests actually raised crocodiles, so you have places where you have hatcheries for the eggs and then they also would have nurseries for the baby crocodiles and sometimes these were killed deliberately, with their heads being bashed in so that they could then be mummified and be given to Sobek as an offering. ♪♪ The ones that were recognized by the priests as having the divine spirit in them were allowed to grow to their full length, 5, 6 meters, and, during the lifetime of that animal, he would be fed and revered and looked after and spoilt rotten, in general. Some of them, according to the Greek writers, had earrings of gold and bracelets made of gold put on them, so someone had to be very brave to go and do this to the god. ♪♪ -And, after their death, the crocodiles were carefully mummified. ♪♪ Surprisingly, these sacred crocs can provide details on Ancient Egypt's climate. In 2003, zoologists studied crocodiles living in isolated pools in Mauretania and Chad. These West African crocs are smaller and more docile than the more familiar Nile crocodiles found in East Africa today. And DNA analysis has revealed these smaller animals are, in fact, a separate species, called Crocodylus suchus. The DNA analysis also revealed they're the exact same species as the sacred Ancient Egyptian crocodiles. -Recently, we've been doing DNA on mummified crocodiles and the results have been truly spectacular because we did a huge crocodile from Kom Ombo and it turned out to be Cr ocodylus suchus, which is a desert crocodile. In a way, it makes sense that these nicer, kinder, gentler ones were allowed to grow and sort of co-habit with humans and be the benign version of the crocodile god. -How did the pharaohs' sacred crocodiles end up on the other side of the African continent and what does that mean for Ancient Egypt's climate? -So we know that we have mummified suchus in Egypt and we know that we have living suchus, quite a few of them, in fact, in the deserts of Mauritania, as well as in Chad. So here we've got these populations that are quite far apart, but they're the same animal. So what was going on here? We started to look for fossils, to see if we could find any other evidence that could link these different populations of crocodiles together. And, throughout the Sahara, we've, in fact, found lots of fossils of crocodiles, in Libya, Niger, in Mali, throughout Algeria, and also in Morocco. So that means that, in ancient times, all of the space must've been connected by a series of waterways, for the crocodiles to move to and fro, and it wasn't always the desert that it is today. ♪♪ -5,000 years ago, the Sahara Desert was actually a savanna, crisscrossed by a network of interconnected waterways, which allowed crocodiles to move freely throughout North Africa. The carvings on Unas's causeway reflected reality. [ Birds chirping ] When the pyramids were built, they were surrounded by savanna. [ Insects chirping ] But, when did Egypt dry out and become a desert and could this have played a part in the demise of the Old Kingdom and led to the mass grave? ♪♪ Elephantine, in the middle of the Nile, between Qubbet el-Hawa and Aswan, can shed some light. ♪♪ The ruins here show what was happening to Egypt's climate. ♪♪ Archaeologist Miroslav Barta describes the changes. ♪♪ -This is a fortress dating back to 3,000 BC. At the time, the island of Elephantine consisted of two separated islands: the eastern one and then the western island. ♪♪ The fortress is located in here, on the eastern island. -The fortress was built on the highest ground, 315 feet above sea level. -The reason was that the Nile flood at the beginning of the Old Kingdom was very high. ♪♪ -But the buildings surrounding the fortress show that the level of the Nile began to fall. And, as the water level fell, the city expanded over the rest of the eastern island, which had been partially submerged. And there are even ruins from the lowest part of the island, where the Nile once flowed, that date from after Pepi II. ♪♪ -Now, we stand in the middle of the original depression that was separating the eastern and western island of Elephantine. And, as we can see here, the ancient Egyptians were able to use up the original depression to construct their houses over it. -After Pepi II's death, the level of the Nile had dropped so significantly that the two islands merged into one and the city expanded onto what had previously been the marshes in between. Here is evidence that Egypt's climate was gradually changing and becoming drier during the Old Kingdom. [ Triumphant music plays ] But things would get worse, much worse. [ Foreboding music plays ] [ Wind blowing ] The key to understanding the collapse of the Old Kingdom, and the reasons for the mass grave, lies almost 2,000 miles away, in the glaciers of Mount Kilimanjaro. In 2000, an expedition of American glaciologists, led by Professor Lonnie Thompson, discovered proof of a global climate catastrophe. ♪♪ An ice cap is built of layers and layers of snow gradually piling up that are then compressed into ice. By extracting cores from the ice, Lonnie is able to look back in time. The ice captures a record of what was in the air at the time it was laid down. Studying this ice back in the lab, Lonnie can reconstruct the past climate. These precious cores are preserved in Lonnie's freezer at Ohio State University. -We have over 7,000 meters of ice cores collected from around the world. We have, on this particular rack, those cores which we recovered from Kilimanjaro in 2000. It dates back 11,700 years and, in that record, about the depth of 33 meters, we would find the time that corresponds to the Old Kingdom in Egypt, so we'll take this out and examine it on the light table. -This piece of ice holds a unique record of the climate around the time the Old Kingdom fell apart. -This is what's left after all the measurements have been made on the core, so. And this record starts about 5,000 years before present, so we're coming forward in time and you see this very distinct band. ♪♪ And it was really amazing, in the field, when this thing showed up, yeah. There's a lot of excitement because you know you have something. It's gonna take you a while to figure out. No, it's very exciting. -This ominous, dark layer is the result of the dramatic climate change that led to the collapse of the Old Kingdom. -This black line that you see here in the core is a layer of dust, windblown dust, that accumulated on the ice field. This is the largest dust event we've found in an ice core, so it's very, very highly concentrated. It would suggest that there was a massive drought throughout this region. -And Lonnie has found more physical signs of this drought, on the other side of the world. -In the same time period, we have found a similar layer in the Huascarán ice cores in the Andes, in Peru. We also see it over in the Himalayas, which suggests that there was a major drought throughout the tropics. ♪♪ -Crucially, he was able to date this drought. [ Music intensifies ] -Based on our Kilimanjaro timescale, we estimate the event occurs around 4,200 years ago, the time of the collapse of the Old Kingdom. ♪♪ -Could this massive global drought have been what brought the Old Kingdom to its knees and led to the death of the soldiers in the mass grave? [ Suspenseful music climbs ] [ Suspenseful chords striking ] [ Foreboding music plays ] Over the course of the Old Kingdom, Egypt was gradually turning from savannah into desert. Agriculture was entirely dependent on the annual flooding of the Nile. Each summer, the rains falling on the highlands of Ethiopia flow into the Nile, causing it to overflow its banks, flooding the fields and depositing rich soil which fertilizes the crops. [ Suspenseful music plays ] If Lonnie is right, this climate spike would have had a disastrous impact on the Nile floods and the people of the Old Kingdom. [ Wind blowing ] Back in Egypt, geologist- turned-archaeologist Professor Fekri Hassan has been looking for proof that this global calamity did, indeed, hit the land of the pharaohs. -There were indications that there are problems in other parts of the world at that time, caused by climate change. It was tempting to think that this might be the case in Egypt as well. -But, in Egypt, there is no ice. He's had to find another way of seeing into the past: mud. He takes cores from the bottom of Lake Qarun, just south of Cairo. The lake is fed by the Nile, which deposits layers of sediment on the bottom, and, just like ice, these layers hold a record of the past climate. Back in the lab in Cairo, Fekri has analyzed the cores. -These were the cores we got. It consisted of a sequence from the bottom of the lake that spans 10,000 years. These are the oldest ones, that were before the rise of civilization, where the lake was quite deep and, as we move to this way, this part it the Old Kingdom. This is the whole history of the Nile floodplain over the last 10,000 years. It's never been available before. -The core reveals that, during the Old Kingdom, the lake was much larger and deeper than today... ♪♪ ...its depth fluctuating around 200 feet. -This part of the core here is the part that represents the Old Kingdom. What is amazing in this part is this break, where we had the presence of a thick layer of gypsum, the whitish material. This is a mineral, which forms under shallow water conditions and evaporative conditions. Mixed with the gypsum, we have the deposits of the iron oxide, the reddish material. Iron oxide usually form under very shallow water conditions, where oxygen is present, either very, very shallow water or almost no water. That would mean that the lake was almost dry; if not bone-dry, just extremely shallow pools. [ Ethereal vocals join ] -The layer of gypsum and iron ore shows that this deep, freshwater lake dried up, leaving behind just a few ephemeral pools of water. -You know, maybe 60, 70 meters of water disappeared. ♪♪ From the different radio carbon age determinations of the core, we were able to determine that this layer here represents time around 4,200 years ago, which correlates to the end of the Old Kingdom. ♪♪ -Fekri's discovery confirms that the global drought seen in the ice cores also hit Egypt hard, just at the time the Old Kingdom collapsed. -We were able to find the smoking gun. This is the hard evidence for this event, this catastrophic event. The thickness of this layer and the fact that the very deep lake had to dry up, it would indicate that we are dealing with no less than 20 years of reduced Nile floods. -This disastrous drought was the knockout punch which pushed Egypt into chaos. -I think climate change leading to a reduction of Nile floods is the cause of the collapse of the Old Kingdom. Egypt depends on the Nile. If anything goes wrong with the Nile, then it would be famine and chaos. If the Nile is low for 20 years or even more, it means that agriculture production would stop. -Ankhtifi, the local governor, was right: the whole of Egypt would've been like a starving locust. -That means that the king does not have enough revenues, not even for his own household, not to mention for the viziers and the managers and people engaged in the governments, so, the whole civilization comes to a stop. [ Suspenseful music climbs ] It's a great lesson about how abrupt climate change can be and how civilizations, no matter how mighty they are, can really suffer from events like that. [ Outro plays ] -This terrible climate crisis, combined with the underlying political problems, created the perfect storm, which destroyed the Old Kingdom and ultimately set the stage for the mass grave. In the face of famine and economic crisis, Pepi II's politically weak successors lost control of the country. Egypt fractured into city-states. But the turmoil and violence would last far longer than the drought itself. [ Swords clinking ] Even as the 20-year drought ended and the Nile level rose, Egypt remained divided and vulnerable. As prosperity gradually returned, it wasn't long before the regional governors, like Ankhtifi, developed ambitions to conquer the whole country. The consequence was war for 130 years. [ Shouting, swords clinking ] The soldiers in the mass grave likely died, not in the initial chaos caused by the famine, [ Poignant tune plays ] but right at the end of the protracted civil war that followed. Roughly 40 years after the drought ended, the rulers of Thebes, modern-day Luxor, took control of the South and the location of the mass grave near Luxor suggests the soldiers were Thebans. Meanwhile, another family of local rulers, from a town called Heracleopolis, had taken control of the North. [ Sinister music plays ] Egypt was split in two and both sides wanted control of the entire country. In 2040 BC, the Thebans captured most of the North and they reached Heracleopolis itself. They were led by a king named Mentuhotep II. He was a great general. His name even means "Montu the god of war is satisfied," and he finally conquered Heracleopolis, [ Shouting, swords clinking ] in a bloody siege. [ Suspenseful music climbs ] [ Cheering, swords clinking ] [ Wind whistles ] Salima believes it's possible that these soldiers, now more than 4,000 years old, took part in this final battle. -Amongst these bodies, there was a lot of linen and some of the linen had marks on it. And these are actually associated with the temple of Mentuhotep II. This, together with the fact that the temple is right there, underneath his tomb, means that the soldiers were fighting for Mentuhotep II. [ Sinister music plays ] -And that's not all. Close analysis of the injuries provides more details about what caused them. -Looking at these arrows that went into the necks of these soldiers, you can see that the trajectory is from above and it's the same thing with all of these head wounds. It's like someone was hitting them from above. So, clearly, it would seem that these soldiers were up against an enemy that was higher than they were, as if they were in a fortress, as if there were some sort of siege situation, and that these soldiers of Mentuhotep were attacking some kind of fort and people were hitting them from above, raining down arrows, throwing rocks. And, maybe, when they came too close, hitting them hard with clubs and maces. [ Suspenseful chords strike ] -It would seem these soldiers were fighting for Mentuhotep in the deciding battle of the civil war. -All of this put together makes us think that these soldiers were fighting at the siege of Heracleopolis. -After the battle was won, Mentuhotep II declared himself king of the entire country, reunifying Egypt at last, and he is believed to have had the soldiers buried above his own mortuary temple as a sign of honor. -It's a huge honor for anyone to be buried that close to the king, so, clearly, he valued them and he, himself, must have paid for the funeral, with all of these temple linens being used. So, obviously, he valued their work and their loyalty and their bravery and kept them near him so that they would be united for eternity. [ Suspenseful chords striking ] [ Suspenseful music climbs, chords striking ]

Tombs of Amun URL https://www.pbs.org/video/egypts-tombs-of-amun-uggfz5/ VIDEO TRANSCRIPT ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ NARRATOR: In Egypt, a team of archaeologists has made an extraordinary discovery. ZAHI HAWASS: I never thought that anything like this would be discovered. NARRATOR: A cemetery hidden for millennia. AFIFI ROHIM: We can see the burial chamber. NARRATOR: No one knew of its existence. We are in front of a sealed tomb. NARRATOR: How many tombs will they find? This is really exciting. NARRATOR: What lies within? ROHIM: We are sure that this tomb intact tomb. NARRATOR: Now, from the Egyptian desert, incredible artifacts emerge. HAWASS: Beautiful-- this is the first time I see something like this. NARRATOR: Who was buried here? These individuals were wealthy. NARRATOR: Now these lost tombs are revealing a unique period in Egyptian history, when kings from the south conquered and ruled Egypt and Egyptian women had more power and prestige than ever before. JULIA BUDKA: The god's wife of Amun was really the female substitute of the king. MARIAM AYAD: The god's wife of Amun was as important as a medieval pope. NARRATOR: Who were these outsiders who ruled Egypt? And how did they help women rise to such heights? ♪ ♪ "Egypt's Tombs of Amun," right now, on "NOVA." ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ NARRATOR: Ancient Egypt, a civilization that lasted for more than 3,000 years. From towering pyramids to palatial rock-cut tombs, from sprawling temples to soaring obelisks, its long history is meticulously recorded on the walls of Egyptian temples, colossal statues, and the artifacts the Egyptians buried in their tombs. Leading the Egyptian people was a succession of about 300 rulers, divided into 31 dynasties lasting from around 3200 to 300 BCE. These were the pharaohs, who were both heads of state, as well as divine intermediaries between the people and their gods. Most of the history of Ancient Egypt unfolds over three major periods of unity and prosperity. The Old Kingdom, the era of the pyramids. The Middle Kingdom, a classical age, when literature and the arts flourished. And the New Kingdom, when Egypt extended its control beyond its borders and became an empire. As well as three periods of instability in between, called the First, Second, and Third Intermediate Periods. The New Kingdom is probably the best-known period in Ancient Egypt because we have all those temples, we have huge amounts of royal stelar texts and inscriptions. Egypt was completely connected with the Mediterranean, with the Near East, with the south. It's really the first evidence for globalization in our history. ♪ ♪ People were living together, people were copying things, they're creating something new. NARRATOR: The New Kingdom is considered Egypt's golden age, a time of wealth, prosperity, and power. ♪ ♪ Pharaohs like Ramesses II and Hatshepsut build magnificent temples, and incredible treasures, like the ones found in the tomb of Tutankhamun, are produced. But after nearly 500 years of splendor, things start to change. There were internal political problems, economic problems, periods of hunger, civil wars. NARRATOR: During this time of declining prosperity, the state collapses, allowing self-proclaimed regional rulers to grab power and divide the country. After the fall of the New Kingdom, Egypt fell into a dark, dark, dark age of political fragmentation. It's known as the Third Intermediate Period. NARRATOR: Starting in 1069 BCE, the Third Intermediate Period lasts for more than 300 years. The archaeological record from this period of Egyptian history is fragmented. The story of the people who lived during these times is largely unknown. But now new information is being uncovered 400 miles south of Cairo, in an excavation happening in Egypt's richest archaeological area: Luxor. BUDKA: The modern city of Luxor was the ancient Thebes, and for centuries, it was the religious capital of Egypt. NARRATOR: Some of the most famous ancient sites are here: temples to the most important gods on the East Bank of the Nile; the funerary temples of the pharaohs and the vast Necropolis, or city of the dead, to the west. The popular belief is, we know already everything. We have deciphered the hieroglyphs. We have so many temples and tombs. We know what happened. This is actually not the case. And every single archaeological dig can teach you a lot. NARRATOR: In September 2020, a team of Egyptian archaeologists led by Zahi Hawass started excavating a new site there, on the West Bank of the Nile, and discovered a long-lost city. We discovered one house, and this house led us to this major important discovery. The lost golden city. NARRATOR: Built by Tutankhamun's grandfather Amenhotep III in the 14th century BCE, the lost city is a sprawling maze of serpentine walls, houses, workshops, and administration buildings. For centuries, no one knew of its existence. The lost city is built on prime ancient real estate in the area known as Medinet Habu on the West Bank of the ancient city of Thebes. It took the archaeologists nearly two years to fully excavate it. HAWASS: When we found the lost golden city, I really wanted to extend the area in the north. This is known in the map as the Triangle. This area is empty-- no one really ever excavated it. NARRATOR: For decades, it's been just a patch of desert next to the main tourist route. Every morning, dozens of buses whiz past on their way to the famous sites. Hundreds of tourists take to the sky on hot air balloons. It would seem an unlikely place for a big discovery. ♪ ♪ In September 2022, two years after the lost city was discovered, the team starts excavating the Triangle. As soon as the archaeologists remove the first layer of sand, they uncover mud bricks-- evidence that there might be more to be found. Zahi decides to concentrate the team's efforts in this area. Within days, they uncover a row of large pottery vessels. Remarkably, they are still sealed. As they open one, they are about to find something very telling: a clear indication of what this site once was. Huh. What's this? It's kind of plants. NARRATOR: The plants appear to have been burned. What's this? ROHIM: Linen. Linen? And we will take all the filling outside to be sure what's behind this. HAWASS: Oh! Broken pottery! This is a ritual. NARRATOR: The contents of the pots all relate to a funerary ritual. BUDKA: During mummification, the embalming workshops produced leftovers that was regarded as something important. They were not just put somewhere as trash, but they were arranged in deposits. Sometimes they deposited linen, organic remains, botanical remains. Very often, we find broken pots inside the vessels. And this is what in general we call embalming cache. NARRATOR: An embalming cache is the collection of the precious leftovers of materials used during the mummification process. BUDKA: Finding a cache of embalming material tells you immediately that you have found something associated with a cemetery. And you should probably look for a tomb nearby. NARRATOR: This is a momentous find. ♪ ♪ Is the team on the verge of a new important discovery? (people talking in background) Excited, they split into groups, each tackling a different corner of the Triangle. Soon, they uncover evidence of several tombs. The archaeologists are standing on a previously unknown burial ground. It's not every day that you find a brand-new cemetery. So this is really exciting. NARRATOR: When was this cemetery built? And who was buried here? HAWASS: Work in this big, large cemetery, it's a challenge. It needs to be excavated completely to understand the date. The excavation will give us more information about the people who are buried in this large cemetery. BUDKA: The burials are located on the West Bank, because in the Egyptian concept of the netherworld, the entrance to the netherworld is on the west. The sun rises in the east and sets in the west, and this is what a human life should repeat. ♪ ♪ NARRATOR: The Ancient Egyptians invested vast amounts of wealth and energy preparing for life after death. The belief of the afterlife built Egypt. That belief made the Egyptian to build pyramids, tombs, and temples. NARRATOR: They believed that life continued after death, and the tomb was considered the house for eternity. For those who could afford it, the mummified body would have laid to rest inside beautifully decorated tombs. BUDKA: There's the popular belief that the Ancient Egyptians were obsessed by death, and that they were only caring about life in the netherworld. This is, of course, definitely not the case. The Egyptians were people like us, so they wanted to live. Mortuary rituals is actually something that helps the living to overcome, um, their sorrow, their grief. ♪ ♪ What you find in tombs tells you so much about society and about the living. ♪ ♪ NARRATOR: Tombs are time capsules that can preserve information about ancient people for millennia. HAWASS: You can gain a lot of knowledge and information about burials, and that's why this cemetery needs more excavation. NARRATOR: The tombs in the Triangle are all different. Some have a shaft dug straight into the ground. And at the bottom, they open up to the burial chamber. Some have grand entrances, complete with a staircase, and more than one room carved into the rock. Archaeology is dangerous for archaeologists. ♪ ♪ It's hard work. (man grunts, people talking in background) It's to live dangerously. But to live dangerously, it's fun, also. It's amazing when you make a new, important discovery. ♪ ♪ You completely forget dangers. Archaeology is like a box of chocolate. What is this? You never know what you get. Looks like part of a necklet. NARRATOR: Four months into the excavation, and the archaeologists haven't found any mummies yet. But intriguing artifacts emerge from the tombs. ROHIM: Here I found a metal eye used in wooden coffins. Wow! NARRATOR: A gold ring with a carved carnelian. Amulets believed to protect the deceased with their magical powers. And shabtis, images of the tomb owner, who the ancient Egyptians believed did all the manual labor in the netherworld. With only one month left before desert temperatures rise and work must stop, site director Afifi Rohim starts working in tomb number six, one that he finds most promising. The cut in the mountain is very good. We have a staircase and we have this corridor. Till now, most of the debris is still original debris. Mm. (speaking Arabic) (Ahmed El Nasseh speaking Arabic) ROHIM: (Baghdadi speaking Arabic) ROHIM: Mm. (others speaking Arabic) ROHIM: BAGHDADI: ROHIM: BAGHDADI: ROHIM: Mm. NARRATOR: Most tombs discovered in Egypt have been looted in antiquity. If there are no objects mixed in the sand, it could mean two things: either the tomb is unfinished or no one has entered it since it was sealed thousands of years ago. HAWASS: There is no tomb that could be looted if, in a shaft, you have clean sand. NARRATOR: This is tantalizing evidence that tomb number six might be intact. The workers remove bucket after bucket of sand. ♪ ♪ Then, suddenly, the density of the sediment changes. ROHIM: He start to find very compact layer. Looks like mother rock. And this means that all this layer was the original layer, which, in the ancient time, they make it the filling for the shaft. If it is, it will be really untouch. NARRATOR: What drives archaeologists to endure the hot desert environment is the promise of revealing long-forgotten histories and, sometimes, the chance to come face to face with an Ancient Egyptian. In tomb number six, skilled worker Baghdadi is getting closer to the bottom of the shaft. For archaeologist Ahmed El Nasseh, this tomb is puzzling. EL NASSEH: We are still confused because we have natural layers, the compact layer, similar to the bedrock, and below, we have sandy layer, which is loose. We will follow the bedrock to find the limit of the burial shaft. (Baghdadi and El Nasseh speaking Arabic) EL NASSEH: He found mudbrick, so, I think we are in front of the blocked doorway. ♪ ♪ NARRATOR: It's exciting news. There's a good chance the burial chamber has not been opened since it was originally sealed with mudbrick thousands of years ago. Good news at the end of the day. ♪ ♪ NARRATOR: The following day at the excavation site, it all looks like a normal morning. But just below the surface in tomb number six, the expectations are high. Afifi is checking the mudbricks that block the entrance to the burial chamber. ROHIM: The seal of the doorway is just directly under the mother rock. It means that it, it never open before. This tomb was confusing for us. In the beginning, we thought there's nothing here. Was thinking that, stop the work and leave the shaft. NARRATOR: And Afifi is also concerned about the safety of the crew working in the tomb. The mother rock is not straight, so I try to check if it is still in original situ or just fall down. NARRATOR: On closer inspection, Afifi notices that a couple of the mudbricks have collapsed under the weight of the rock above, leaving a small opening. Over time, the sand has seeped through. With great anticipation, Baghdadi starts removing the mudbricks. Once the passage is cleared, work inside the chamber begins. At first, it's just clean sand. But soon, artifacts emerge. HAWASS: Is this amethyst? Huh? ROHIM: Yeah, could be. Oh, oh! Beautiful vase-- God! (chuckles) Hm. This is not Egyptian. This is so strange. Doesn't looks Egyptian-- even the colors. NARRATOR: The style of this tiny pot is nothing like any artifact the team has found before. Was it imported from a distant land? HAWASS: This is a very important discovery. The artifacts are now really unique. Very happy. NARRATOR: Then Zahi comes face to face with a special object. HAWASS (speaking Arabic): This is the first time I see something like this. The lady is seated, having a gazelle on her hand and holding her son on the back. Can you hold this? This is another one. She is standing, and on her back, she is holding a child. This could be someone from outside Egypt. NARRATOR: The statuettes confirm Zahi's hunch. The style of the artifacts is not traditionally Egyptian. The depiction of the face hints at people originating from beyond Egypt's borders. And then there's the speckled texture. The distinctive spotted look, combined with the shapely woman's frame, was only produced during a crucial moment in the history of Egypt, when the country is ruled by foreigners: the 11th century BCE, the start of the unstable Third Intermediate Period. Egypt had economic problems, only very short-lived kings, quarrels about the inheritance of the throne. Egypt was vulnerable. NARRATOR: But this changes when Egypt's southern neighbors, the Kushites-- also known as the Nubians-- take advantage of Egypt's weakness, and, in 712 BCE, they move in and conquer the Land of the Pharaohs. We refer to the Kushites as the kings of the XXV dynasty. And this dynasty was originally coming from modern Sudan. NARRATOR: Known for rich deposits of gold, Nubia is home to some of Africa's earliest kingdoms. The Egyptians first called Nubia Ta-Seti, the Land of the Bow, highlighting the skill of Nubian warriors. BUDKA: When the Kushites invaded Egypt, they erected a very, very powerful and very successful empire for roughly 70, 80 years. AYAD: The Nubians were restorers. After things were destroyed and the temples were neglected, the Nubians were now going to take care of everything, put everything back in order. NARRATOR: Egypt is prosperous again. ♪ ♪ BUDKA: They made themselves kings of both Egypt and Kush. The Egyptian culture was part of their own heritage, because, in the New Kingdom, Nubia was an Egyptian colony. NARRATOR: Few written records or artifacts of the people that lived under Kushite rule in Egypt survive today. Which makes what the team is unearthing in the Triangle especially rare. (speaking Arabic): I really could not believe that statues like this could exist. It's unique. The color. They are very realistic. NARRATOR: Not only do the two statuettes both show a woman, but some of the small pots that have been found are for makeup. This tomb for sure belonged this woman. NARRATOR: Women in Ancient Egypt have the right to buy and inherit property. They can represent themselves in court, own a business, and get divorced. But it isn't exactly an egalitarian society. BUDKA: There was a small percentage of women who were highly privileged, but nevertheless, there was a gender bias in Ancient Egypt. This is why I think it's not fair to say it's a paradise for women in the ancient world. NARRATOR: But when the Kushites take over Egypt, they bring with them a Nubian culture in which women have power. In the Kushite time, women had a different status than before and after. There is a matrilineal system for the Kushite kingdom. It was more important who was your mother than who was your father. And this might be the main difference between Egypt and Kush. ♪ ♪ NARRATOR: Mariam Ayad has spent her entire career studying Ancient Egyptian women, and especially the women of the XXV dynasty. Zahi has invited Mariam to see the objects found in tomb number six. HAWASS: This tomb was really unique. We found some very impressive artifacts. If you look at the face... AYAD: Yeah? ...it looks Nubian to me. It does look Nubian, for sure. This body type of the standing woman... Yeah. That body type we find a lot during the XXV dynasty. Yes. The heavier lower body, the heavier hips. I have never seen statues like this. I don't think there's ever statues of that type ever produced before or possibly even after. ♪ ♪ NARRATOR: When the Kushites conquer Egypt around 700 BCE, they decide to embrace the Egyptians' religious customs and beliefs. BUDKA: In Ancient Egypt, we cannot separate kingship from religion. Pharaohs invested so much in the religious landscape of Thebes. NARRATOR: And this strategy is best seen at Karnak, a vast temple complex where pharaohs dedicated great building projects to Amun, the king of the gods. ♪ ♪ When the Kushite kings arrive, they, too, make their marks here. One of the monuments, built by Kushite king Taharqa, reveals a new and distinctive level of power for women in Egypt. AYAD: We're here by the edifice of Taharqa at the sacred lake. We can't call it the temple, because it doesn't have some of the main features we associate with temples. The only part of the building that survives is the subterranean chambers. NARRATOR: What's special about this monument is a relief on a wall hidden from view. AYAD: And because there's no proper entrance, we'll have to climb up. It's a part of the building with ritual scenes that are unique and not found elsewhere. NARRATOR: The scene Mariam is looking for is one-of-a-kind. It depicts two figures protecting a sacred tomb. AYAD: On either side, the figures are facing outward as a way of protecting it. In Egyptian art, it's very rare for figures to be facing outward and not toward the center. The king is throwing four balls, and he's aiming at four targets-- east, west, north, and south. NARRATOR: Opposite the king, a female figure. AYAD: She is complementing his actions, asserting the royal dominion over the four extremities of the Earth. She is drawing an arrow through a double-arched bow, and this is very rare, to find a woman actively arching. Very rare. Even the goddess Neith, who's known as the goddess of war, and who's often called the mistress of bow and arrows, she's mostly holding them in her hand. As far as Egyptian iconography is concerned, this is a unique representation of female power. NARRATOR: Who is this woman? Her title is god's wife of Amun. To understand how a woman might attain such power in Egypt, we need to go back 800 years, when the title of god's wife of Amun first appears. Carved on a stone slab, or stela, is the title's earliest evidence. This is the Ahmose Nefertari's donation stela. Ahmose Nefertari was the wife of King Ahmose, the founder of the XVIII dynasty. As part of his larger state policy to put trusted family members in key positions around the realm, she was appointed as the god's wife of Amun. As far as we know, she's the first woman to hold that title. NARRATOR: With this stela, King Ahmose establishes the estate of the god's wife as a source of revenue for his queen. The stela records large amounts of gold, silver, and copper, as well as servants and land. AYAD: On the donation stela of Ahmose Nefertari, there is a very telling line. It says, "No future king shall ever revoke the estate of the god's wife of Amun." NARRATOR: With this line, Ahmose makes sure that this newly established estate will last in perpetuity. AYAD: The women who held that title remained financially independent, and it seems plausible to suggest that it's because of that initial endowment. NARRATOR: Although the title of god's wife of Amun first appears during the New Kingdom, over time, the position becomes less relevant. But then, during the Kushites' reign, this role takes on a completely new and powerful meaning. AYAD: When the Nubians invaded Egypt, they were quick to recognize the political value of having that institution. The office was resurrected after centuries of oblivion. So Amenirdis I becomes the first Nubian woman to become a god's wife of Amun. NARRATOR: The Kushite princess Amenirdis is the sister of Pianky, the first king of the XXV dynasty. On becoming the god's wife of Amun, Amenirdis effectively takes control of Thebes. AYAD: Her installation served to achieve a smooth transition of power from the preceding dynasty to the Nubian rule in Egypt. ♪ ♪ Amenirdis participated in rituals that no other woman was allowed to participate in before. BUDKA: In the XXV dynasty, the god's wife of Amun was much more important than in previous times. The god's wife of Amun was the female substitute of the king. AYAD: The god's wife of Amun was as important as a medieval pope in terms of the temporal and religious power that she held. NARRATOR: In a side corridor at the Cairo Museum, a statue found in Karnak Temple reveals how much power the god's wife of Amun, Amenirdis, really had. It's carved from alabaster, a soft, translucent form of gypsum rock. (sighs) The one and only Amenirdis I, royal princess. It's not very common to find statues of that size in alabaster. She looks exactly like an Egyptian queen. The headdress, the modius crown on her head, but she has that pendant of Amun, and that might be a Nubian feature. On the back pillar, she asserts her moral character. She gave bread to the hungry, water to the thirsty, and clothes to the naked. Now, this is significant, because if you are giving food to the hungry, water to the thirsty, you have agency. It's not just about generosity, it's also about having the means to do so and having the autonomy to do so, and to have a woman have that kind of inscription is very rare. NARRATOR: Back at the site, the statuettes from tomb number six signal a burial of the XXV dynasty, the period when Amenirdis was the god's wife of Amun. ♪ ♪ Now archaeologists are on the hunt for more clues that might reveal the identity of the woman buried in tomb number six. But the excavation season is coming to an end. With summer approaching, the soaring temperatures would make work in the tombs impossible. ♪ ♪ With only a couple of weeks left, Afifi has found a vessel. ROHIM: We found one of the canopic jars. It's from fine limestone. And even the sculpture of the face is, is so good. NARRATOR: During the mummification process, the organs of the deceased would be removed and placed in these containers. They are known as canopic jars. ROHIM: Each burial have four canopic jars-- four organs of the deceased. NARRATOR: Each jar is topped with a different symbolic sculpture. The heads represent the four sons of the god Horus. Each was responsible for protecting a particular organ: the jackal for the stomach, the human head for the liver, the baboon for the lungs, and the falcon for the intestines. ROHIM: It's empty. NARRATOR: Afifi is looking for any inscription which could give us the name of the owner of this tomb. Just behind the first jar, a second one appears. I want to take the body first. Oh! It's nice inscriptions. Yes, yes. I am not specialist in Ancient Egyptian language, but I can read, "Osir... ...djer," or, "djerek saa." Mean something related to Osir. NARRATOR: The inscription is a prayer to the god Osiris, ruler of the underworld. I see the base of the lid. It's complete. No cracks-- nothing. It's baboon. (blows out) Now we have to consolidate the writing. NARRATOR: The jars have been hiding in the tomb for nearly 3,000 years. Before they can be taken out, conservator Seham Abdelazeim needs to carefully protect this ancient writing with a water-soluble cellulose binder. The jars don't reveal the name of the deceased, but Afifi believes there are more artifacts waiting to be found. But before he continues to excavate, he needs to secure the tomb. This layers of sediments is, is not strong and it is not safe for working, especially when you open it and the fresh air gets inside. So it's decayed, and start to dry and fall down. So we need to make all this support and, to continue our work. ♪ ♪ NARRATOR: The excavation season has come to an end. The workers prepare supports in an effort to secure tomb number six. Once ready, Afifi locks it with a metal gate. The team needs to wait until September, when the excavation will resume. ♪ ♪ When you discover something interesting, you can feel happy. Of course, I have to be more patient, and... When we stop excavation in the site, doesn't mean that the work stop. Because we continue working, in writing the general report, make analysis for the object, and still thinking about the future season. ♪ ♪ NARRATOR: Five months later, the heat has come and gone. The archaeologists return to the excavation site, eager to pick up the work from where they left it. ♪ ♪ As Afifi and Ahmed reenter tomb number six, something does not look right. ROHIM (speaking Arabic): EL NASSEH (speaking Arabic): ROHIM: ROHIM: All the tomb collapsed. All the roof collapsed. And there are cracks everywhere inside the tomb. NARRATOR: The ground above has caved in, filling the deep shaft that the team spent days excavating. And now, it's too dangerous to clear the debris. I think we lost this tomb. We can't remove the debris. We can't even just get inside to check it, because the cracks in the roof and the walls everywhere. It's not safe for the workers and for my team, and this is our job in archaeology. Nothing to do. Moving to the next stop. (speaking Arabic): NARRATOR: With sadness, the team has to give up on ever finding the woman who was buried here. She will likely remain in her tomb for eternity, just as she originally planned. The Ancient Egyptians recorded everything, especially on their burial goods. Thousands of years later, the archaeologists are on the hunt for clues that might reveal details of long-lost lives. ♪ ♪ At the southern edge of the Triangle, in tomb number nine, the archaeologists haven't found any mummies. But sunk into the floor of the burial chamber, the lids of four canopic jars appear. ROHIM: We found this set of four canopic jars here, underneath the floor. I have to take it out. NARRATOR: Afifi examines the vessel in the hope it will reveal the name of the person who was buried here. There is no text, just black decoration. Something strange for me-- the body is made from alabaster, but the head from limestone. NARRATOR: He carefully removes the second jar. Oh, it's different. It's made of alabaster, but it has a stand made of limestone. It's rare to find canopic jar with a stone stand like this. And I think it has some inscriptions. NARRATOR: The inscription is lightly carved, but since alabaster is translucent, Afifi tries to read it using a small light. I can read the text now. "Djet medu Duamutef." It means "offering to Duamutef," one of four son of Horus. "Satirdis." Her name is Satirdis. So it's for a woman, and she was a female singer in Amun house. NARRATOR: Finally, the team has a name for the owner of the tomb: Asetirdis, the singer, or chantress, in the Temple of Amun. AYAD: The god's wife had chantresses in her entourage. Chantresses were very prominent in Theban society. In temple ritual, we would see women chantresses making music to the gods. It makes a lot of sense that chantresses in the House of Amun would be buried just outside the temple at Medinet Habu, because that was thought to be the place of the primeval mound. NARRATOR: In Egyptian mythology, the primeval mound was the first piece of land to emerge from the watery chaos-- where life was first created. AYAD: The god Amun would come across the river aged, tired. He comes back to this primeval place, where he would commune with eight primeval gods. He would go back rejuvenated and youthful again. NARRATOR: The tombs in the Triangle are located on this sacred land. The people buried here could have a close connection to the god Amun. The people who are buried here could be working in this great institution, the office of the god's wife of Amun. ♪ ♪ NARRATOR: And in the heart of this holy place, the god's wife, Amenirdis, has her own funerary chapel. AYAD: We are at the great temple of Medinet Habu, and everyone knows it for the funerary temple of Ramesses III, and they walk just straight past this wonderful chapel of Amenirdis. Even though the façade itself has wonderful inscriptions, no one ever stops to look at them. Here we have Amenirdis offering Maat, which is the concept of truth and harmony and global order, to Amun and his divine consort, Mut. This representation is unique for a woman. It's unique because it's the prerogative of the king only, who is seen as the ultimate preserver of Maat. And we don't see that any time before that period. NARRATOR: In the XXV dynasty, the god's wife of Amun has a much more active and visible role than ever before. Only the king can build on sacred land, so the fact that Amenirdis has a large stone monument here is meaningful. AYAD: Construction of funerary chapels, any kind of temple, is the royal prerogative, and only the king could do that, but repeatedly, we see the god's wife erect chapels on their own. To anyone, even those who could not read, the iconography itself told any bystander that these women were as important as the king. NARRATOR: And historians believe that this level of prestige for women was only attained when the Kushites from Nubia ruled Egypt. BUDKA: I believe we have a certain difference in the importance of women during the XXV dynasty, because they were just importing their role from Kush to Egypt. The role of women was different in the Kushite culture. The royal women had much power, and part of this was imported to Egypt. I don't think it's a coincidence that this office of the god's wife really flourished under foreign rule. NARRATOR: Since excavation began in the Triangle, the team has uncovered several tombs. One has an impressive wide staircase. With a large quantity of debris removed, the archaeologists can now access the burial chamber. We remove all the debris from the room itself until we found a group of coffins. NARRATOR: The human remains are in a very bad state of preservation, the mummy wrappings and wooden coffins completely decayed. Only the bones of these individuals survive. EL NASSEH: Maybe it's a family tomb, and now we are working to find some object dating this tomb, like canopic jars with the titles and the name of the owner. NARRATOR: Skilled excavator Badawi carefully works around one of the coffins. Soon, the top of a canopic jar appears. HAWASS: The canopic jars have some inscriptions. It needs to be clear more. We still have to look for the other three. (speaking Arabic): ♪ ♪ NARRATOR: A second jar. ♪ ♪ And soon a third. HAWASS: Beautiful! This person has to be elite, an important person. It's really well done, modeled. The workshop that made this canopic jars are really perfect. NARRATOR: And finally, on the fourth and last jar, the name of the owner can be read. This is the name of him. ROHIM: His name is Mere. The name Mere Ren-Amun, the singer of the god Amun. This is really wonderful. This person was part of this important office. Those people, one day, were working, singing, dancing behind the great god's wife of Amun. NARRATOR: But the style of the canopic jars is different from the others found in the Triangle. HAWASS: As an archaeologist, you can look at canopic jars and know the period exactly. The modeling of the faces show 500 BC, the XXVI dynasty. Through the archaeological evidence, you can say that the big large cemetery, it started in the north, in dynasty XXV, continued to the edge of the city, known as the golden lost city. The tombs here dated to dynasty XXVI. NARRATOR: When Mere was alive, the Kushites of Nubia were no longer ruling Egypt, yet he is buried next to the people of the XXV dynasty. AYAD: For the Theban elites, this was a good burial ground. It mattered very little who the ruling king was and from which dynasty. Between the XXV dynasty and the XXVI dynasty in Thebes, there is no material break. It's a continuous move from the one dynasty to the other. AYAD: The Theban people are Theban people, so there are generations of the same families living under different kings. NARRATOR: The reign of the XXV dynasty ends around 653 BCE. The new royal family that establishes the XXVI dynasty comes from the north of Egypt, from a city called Sais. But a new king doesn't mean that everything changes. AYAD: The transition from the XXV to the XXVI dynasty is very interesting. We have someone like Montuemhat, who was really a man for all seasons. He was already the mayor of Thebes under the Nubian rulers, he continued to be the mayor of Thebes under the new rulers, and all the while, he took part in the transition in the office of the god's wife, helping establish the new god's wife in place. NARRATOR: A new pharaoh. A new god's wife of Amun. And the people associated with this office keep Medinet Habu as their chosen burial ground. BUDKA: The title god's wife of Amun lasts until the end of the XXVI dynasty. AYAD: At the end of that time, Egypt is invaded by the Persians. And everything changes. NARRATOR: After the Persian invasion, evidence of the god's wife of Amun disappears. Lasting for more than a millennium, the title of god's wife of Amun was created in the XVIII dynasty. But it's 800 years later, in the XXV dynasty, with the help of the Kushite pharaohs from Nubia, that the institution reaches its zenith, Amenirdis's legacy forever imprinted on the artifacts and monuments she left behind. The archaeologists have unearthed buried treasures of a very special period of Egyptian history, when the Kushite pharaohs of the XXV dynasty rose to power and wrote a new chapter into this rich civilization. They embraced Egyptian culture and beliefs, but also brought elements of their own culture, where women were financially independent and the power of the god's wife of Amun rivaled that of the king. AYAD: The god's wife of Amun is very inspiring and empowering to modern women today. The fact that they're not as well known to the public as Cleopatra or Nefertiti is just the sad reality of modern pop culture. ♪ ♪ HAWASS: A unique cemetery to bring more information about this period. Oh! We are making history. NARRATOR: Like the shifting sands of the desert, history is never static. It is a quest for understanding who we are, where we've been, and where we're going. AYAD: People looking at us from even 200 years from now, or 2,000 years from now, how they perceive women today is dependent on how much evidence do we leave behind. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪

SKIN OF GLASS - the Pele de Vidro in Sao Paulo Brasil U.R.L. https://www.pbs.org/video/skin-of-glass-3uc64q/ VIDEO FULL VIDEO VIDEO EXCERPT TRANSCRIPT FULL MOVIE ♪ [Water bubbling] ♪ ♪ [Denise Zmekhol speaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ [Wind blowing] Zmekhol: I left Brazil for a new life in California... with only memories of my father-- the bitter and the sweet... ♪ but now so many years later, news arrives about my father's legacy that reopens childhood wounds and calls me back home to São Paulo... ♪ searching for my father in the work he created. ♪ ♪ This is what brought me back. ♪ It's shocking to see what's happened to my father's architectural masterpiece, knowing what it once was. ♪ ♪ [Man speaking Portuguese] [Woman speaking Portuguese] ♪ [Man speaking Portuguese] [Man speaking Portuguese] ♪ [Man speaking Portuguese] [Woman speaking Portuguese] [Man speaking Portuguese] ♪ [Woman speaking Portuguese] ♪ Zmekhol: A vision of the future 24 stories above São Paulo, the Pele de Vidro-- Skin of Glass. My father designed it in the 1960s, and I was conceived at the same time as this building. ♪ My father was everything a daughter could have dreamed of-- playful, charming, affectionate. ♪ He was born in Paris to parents who immigrated from Syria and then made their new life in Brazil. ♪ Curious, determined, the top of his class, he became a prolific architect as soon as he graduated... ♪ but who was my father as a young man? Going through these photos makes me realize how little I know about his past. We never got a chance to talk about his early years. At 29, he met my mother Graca, like him, a child of Syrian-Lebanese immigrants, and together, they began building dreams. ♪ By their wedding day, my father had already designed our family home. ♪ ♪ [Man speaking Portuguese] Zmekhol: Everything felt possible in those days. It was a time of great hope and optimism in Brazil. [Astrud Gilberto singing in Portuguese] ♪ [Lores speaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ ♪ [Woman speaking Portuguese] Zmekhol: Brasilia, the new capital city, was built from the ground up in 3 short years. ♪ Our country was moving toward modernization and social reform after centuries of extreme inequality. ♪ My parents visited Brasilia during construction. ♪ I can only imagine how this epic project inspired my father. ♪ At the age of 32, he was beginning the most significant work of his lifetime, the Pele de Vidro. ♪ [Meyer speaking Portuguese] [Man speaking Portuguese] ♪ [Man speaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ [Zmekhol speaking Portuguese] ♪ [Gunshot] [Screaming] [Shouting] Construction of the Pele de Vidro was almost finished in 1964 when Brazil's military staged a coup with backing from the United States. It was the height of the Cold War, and the U.S. feared that Brazil was leaning toward communism. 21 years of dictatorship followed, brutally ending Brazil's hopes for social reform. Our promising, tropical democracy vanished... ♪ but I was living in a child's world, safe in the home my father built, surrounded by family and friends. ♪ Yara, our closest neighbor, was like another mother to me. ♪ ♪ [Yara speaking Portuguese] Yara: Heh! ♪ ♪ ♪ [Man singing in Portuguese] ♪ [Rumbling] [Whistle blows, explosion] ♪ [Explosion] ♪ [Explosion] ♪ [People screaming] ♪ Zmekhol: In time, I began to understand what was really going on. The military censored the media and tortured, killed, and exiled people they said were communists. ♪ My father's colleagues at the school of architecture remember that time well. ♪ ♪ ♪ [Zmekhol speaking Portuguese] [Zmekhol speaking Portuguese] [Chico Buarque's "Apesar de Voce" playing] [Zmekhol speaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ ♪ As a child, I often passed by the Pele De Vidro, but I never went inside. Now I come here hoping to meet the people who have made this place their home... but I can't get in. I need the approval of the occupation leaders. [Man speaking Portuguese] Zmekhol: So I wait, looking in from outside. I hear Portuguese, Spanish, French, kids playing... a mother calling her child. I'm so curious about the lives within my father's creation. ♪ People were at the heart of his work. ♪ He designed the Pele de Vidro with great care for the life inside. At a time when most offices were dark and closed, he created a space of light and transparency, a structure open to the world around it. ♪ This is the only photo I ever found of my father at the Pele de Vidro, standing on the rooftop, about to transform the skyline of São Paulo. ♪ [Woman speaking Portuguese] [Wisnik speaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ [Botti speaking Portuguese] ♪ [Woman speaking Portuguese] Zmekhol: Finding my father's drawings at the School of Architecture is a revelation. I had no idea how much was here. [Ferreira de Brito speaking Portuguese] [Paper rustling] ♪ ♪ [Zmekhol speaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ [Camera shutter clicks] Zmekhol: Gal was one of my father's students. Together, we go around São Paulo visiting the buildings my father designed. ♪ ♪ ♪ [Rapid clicking] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ Zmekhol: And finally, the house my father built for our family. It feels so strange that it's now someone else's home. Zmekhol: This garden, so full of memories. Running in circles with my brother... summer dinners with neighbors and friends... but there are shadows here of harder times. ♪ When I was 11, I began to sense a growing tension between my parents. ♪ Some nights, lying in bed, I could hear my mother crying. ♪ ♪ [Yara speaking Portuguese] ♪ Zmekhol: And then one day, my father left. ♪ ♪ [Speaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ I've been waiting 6 weeks. The occupation leaders say they're asking the residents for permission to let me in... but then, they stop returning my calls. Watching the people, I begin to recognize faces and feel the rhythms of their lives. We are separated by distance and privilege, yet, in a strange way, bound together by what we share-- a home made by my father. [Man speaking Portuguese] Zmekhol: The Pele de Vidro is one of over 70 buildings downtown occupied by people who need homes. The housing crisis has sparked a movement. [Loud banging] [Indistinct chatter] [Cheering] [Man speaking Portuguese] [Indistinct chatter] [Chucre speaking Portuguese] Zmekhol: Péricles is helping me negotiate with the leaders of the Pele de Vidro, and he takes me to one of the occupations he organizes. [Child speaking Portuguese] [Péricles speaking Portuguese] [Woman speaking Portuguese] [Ribeiro speaking Portuguese] [Péricles speaking Portuguese] [Mendes da Rocha speaking Portuguese] [Meyer speaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ ♪ [Acayaba speaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ [Zmekhol speaking Portuguese] [Yara speaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ Zmekhol: At my father's funeral, I felt like a stranger... our angry last words still stinging my heart. Even with Yara there, I felt totally alone. ♪ [Sirens] Zmekhol: A few years after my father died, the federal police made the Pele de Vidro their headquarters... a place for censoring journalists and artists. ♪ My father's creation of openness and light became a center of fear and surveillance... [People clamoring] but the dictatorship was faltering. People across the country were demanding free elections. [Cheering and applause] After two decades of struggle, democracy was restored. The federal police, now working under a democratic government, stayed in the Pele de Vidro. [Indistinct chatter] [Cameras clicking] They made international headlines identifying the remains of the Nazi war criminal Josef Mengele. The federal police left the building in 2003... and for years, the Pele de Vidro stood empty and neglected. ♪ ♪ [Lores speaking Portuguese] [Rain falling] [Man speaking Portuguese] ♪ Zmekhol: It would break my father's heart to see his Pele de Vidro like this, as it does mine... but I see this place has become a shelter, its walls protecting so many, and this touches my heart. ♪ ♪ ♪ [Péricles speaking Portuguese] Zmekhol: I've tried so hard to get inside the Pele de Vidro, but after so many months of negotiations, the door is closed... but I am not giving up. I go to my father's birthplace... the city he loved and would visit often. I'm here to meet an architect with a deep connection to the Pele de Vidro. [Speaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ Zmekhol: Pablo's dream came to an end, and the building remained empty... ♪ but a few years later, the Skin of Glass became a canvas for another vision, a radical street art called pixacão. ♪ Zmekhol: When I first met Rafael, he was very guarded, not sure how I felt about his art on the Pele de Vidro. I wasn't sure either. ♪ [Rafael speaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ Zmekhol: A few months after Rafael's pixacão, people occupied the Pele de Vidro for the first time. A local filmmaker documented them moving in. Finally, a window inside. All this time I imagined if I could only get into the Pele de Vidro, I would find my father there... ♪ but I'm grateful to see this glimpse of life inside. ♪ ♪ [Pablo speaking Portuguese] [Distant sirens] [Low rumbling] [Sirens growing closer] [Overlapping sirens and horns] [Fire roaring] [Radio chatter] [Glass shattering] [Woman speaking Portuguese] Hey, hey, hey! ♪ ♪ ♪ [Zmekhol speaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ ♪ [Woman speaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ [Indistinct chatter] ♪ [Zmekhol speaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ Zmekhol: The governor, the mayor, even the president appear for the cameras... but none of them meet with the survivors just one block away. [Indistinct chatter] [Barbosa speaking Portuguese] [Speaking Portuguese] [Indistinct chatter] ♪ [Zmekhol speaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ ♪ [Speaking Portuguese] [Indistinct chatter] [Speaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ [Woman speaking Portuguese] [Indistinct chatter] [Zmekhol speaking Portuguese] [Indistinct chatter] [Speaking Portuguese] Zmekhol: This is one of the leaders who kept me out of the Pele de Vidro, who abandoned the survivors after the fire. Soon after he and the other Pele de Vidro leaders were questioned by the police, they went into hiding. Months later, the camp is gone without a trace, shut down by the city, the survivors scattered throughout São Paulo, looking for shelter. Many simply vanished into the streets. [Man speaking Portuguese] [Péricles speaking Portuguese] [Speaking French] Zmekhol: Pablo and Philippe have come from France to honor my father's dream and their own. ♪ ♪ ♪ [Philippe speaking French] ♪ Zmekhol: This drawing will never be more than a dream, a vision of what might have been. ♪ Pablo and Philippe invite Rafael, the pixacão artist, to join them. ♪ [Rafael speaking Portuguese] ♪ [Pablo speaking French] ♪ ♪ [Alves speaking Portuguese] [Speaking Portuguese] Ha ha ha! [Speaking Portuguese] ♪ Hmm. ♪ [Man singing in Portuguese] ♪ ♪ ♪ [Zmekhol speaking Portuguese] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪